# News About Twitter



## GURPS

*Right wing figures on Twitter such as Florida's governor, Ron DeSantis, and Donald Trump Jr have seen their number of followers soar*
*Left-leaning people like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Barack Obama have witnessed a noticeable drop in followers*
*The fluctuations have been dramatic since Monday, when Elon Musk's $44 billion takeover of the company was confirmed*
*Twitter on Tuesday confirmed that the figures were organic, and were not due to any internal alterations to their operations*
*Trump Jr, however, did not believe the company and speculated that it was due to artificial restraints on right-wing figures finally being lifted*
*He claimed that the changes were being made before Musk's team took over to avoid an embarrassing expose of their practices *










						Don Jnr and right wingers see giant leaps in Twitter followers
					

Right wing figures on Twitter such as Ron DeSantis and Donald Trump Jr have seen their Twitter followers soar, while left wingers like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Barack Obama slump.




					www.dailymail.co.uk


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## GURPS

Twitter's top lawyer, who blocked the Hunter Biden story, cried during a staff meeting about future changes (Update)​





Even if you overlook her history (and why would you), Gadde does not seem like the right fit for making Twitter more tolerant of free speech. On the contrary, she is part of the problem Musk is hoping to solve. Having her stay on would be asking for trouble. Maybe Gadde knows what’s coming and yesterday’s emotion was partly based on an awareness she’s saying goodbye. Losing this gig will definitely be a big loss for her personally.



> Gadde’s total compensation was more than $16.9 million last year, the San Francisco-based company disclosed in a preliminary annual proxy statement filed April 1. That’s up from the roughly $7.3 million she earned in 2020.


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## GURPS




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## GURPS

*What is going on with Twitter follower counts?*

Yesterday, Elon Musk succeeded in buying Twitter and there were reports that the site’s code had been locked to prevent anyone making any sudden changes, possibly as some kind of protest. To me that suggested that nothing much would change between now and whenever Musk’s team comes in to start making changes. But today I noticed some people on the left complaining that they’d suddenly lost a lot of followers.


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## GURPS

Here’s a blow up of recent data for Hillary Clinton’s account. She suddenly lost 17,000 followers yesterday.






Speaker Pelosi lost more than 13,000:


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## GURPS

And Ted Cruz gained more than 50,000:










Rachel Maddow lost nearly 19,000 but Tucker Carlson gained more than 60,000:


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## GURPS




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## GURPS

Is there ANY doubt Twitter had their thumb on the scale down grading Conservatives


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## Bluecrqbe

I’ve been seeing this too, so we think there were 100k people trying to follow Desantis but couldn’t? I think Twitter folks are now saying, “you want free speech, have it!” And tons of bots are now coming online, here are new spoof accounts I saw yesterday with tens of thousands of followers, it’s partially what made Gab unusable.

Like this….


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## GURPS

Senate Dem: We need "algorithmic justice" now that Musk owns Twitter​





The current ratio on this is roughly 3:1 as of 5:30 pm ET. By the time this post publishes and people have had more head-scratching time, I suspect it might be wider than that. You might as well argue for “edit button justice.” Besides, this is a strange complaint to make when Musk appears to be the only tech titan that has promised to make those algorithms _more_ transparent when he has the authority to make those changes:



> “Twitter has become kind of the de-facto town square,” he said. “It’s just really important that people have both the reality and the perception that they’re able to speak freely within the bounds of the law.”
> In terms of specific changes, Musk said Twitter should open-source its algorithms and minimize the interventions it takes in policing content. “Any changes to people’s tweets — if they’re emphasized or de-emphasized — that action should be made apparent,” he said. “So anyone can see that that action has been taken so there’s no sort of behind-the-scenes manipulation, either algorithmically or manually.”
> He added that the underlying code behind the algorithm should be available on GitHub, so that users could inspect it themselves.


[clip]

In other words, this isn’t really about “algorithms” at all, except as a cover for shenanigans, as Musk hinted. A Twitter user noted this as well in a reply to Markey’s tweet:





Read what Musk said carefully. He doesn’t think it’s the algorithms either. Musk suspects that Twitter employees are intervening in support of their own biases and that of their bosses, and that they blame “algorithm” issues when the results are too absurd to ignore._ That’s_ why Musk wants to make them open-source and transparent, so that any changes not made by algorithms would become instantly apparent.


In Other Words ...... we want Twitter to promote What WE WANT PROMOTED Non of this free thinking


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## GURPS

Rhode Island teacher told 'all 5' classes how Musk's Twitter buyout is worst thing ever​




Sanchez’s Twitter bio shows he works at Central High School in Providence and is running as a "Leftist Candidate for Rhode Island State Representative." Fox News Digital could not confirm what classes he was teaching at the school.









Anti-Capitalist uses Capitalist System to Rage against capitalism, I wonder if he was using his iPhone


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## GURPS




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## GURPS

European Union Fires Warning Shot On Twitter’s Future: ‘Elon, There Are Rules’​
In an interview with the Financial Times Tuesday, EU Commissioner for the Internal Market Thierry Breton said that he was giving Musk a “reality check,” adding that Twitter must cooperate with the EU’s rules on content moderation, including the pending Digital Services Act. The prospective legislation would force large tech platforms to take more action to disclose and remove illegal content, including “hate speech,” as noted by The Guardian.

“We welcome everyone,” Breton told the Financial Times. “We are open but on our conditions. At least we know what to tell him: ‘Elon, there are rules. You are welcome but these are our rules. It’s not your rules which will apply here.’”

Breton was also stern in warning Musk that the consequences for failing to follow EU rules would be severe, including massive penalties and possibly the site being banned from Europe.




Besides banning, can the EU really do anything of you don't have a corporate presence there ?


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## GURPS

How the elites lost the Twitter war​
In this context, debates about free speech and accountability miss the point. There was nowhere near this much panic when Jeff Bezos purchased the _Washington Post _in 2013. Nor, for that matter, do people worry about the fact that Warner Bros Discovery owns CNN or that Comcast owns MSNBC. So why all the hoopla about Musk?

There are two reasons for the excitement. The first is related to Musk himself: his perceived character and affiliations. Elite media and progressive circles tend to regard him as more dangerous than Jack Dorsey, Mark Zuckerberg, and Jeff Bezos n*ot because he is richer or more powerful, but because he is more culturally aligned with various deplorables, from crypto-bros to MAGA-heads to Joe Rogan.*

This perception helps to explain the fretting over Musk’s claim to be a “free speech absolutist”, which human rights groups have warned could usher in a torrent of online hate. But whether or not you think unrestricted free speech is a good thing, it is unlikely to be put into practice. There is widespread agreement that unmoderated public forums are completely unmanageable due to trolling and abuse, and any administrator of any social media platform will have to engage in some filtering or censoring. The worry is about what _kinds _of speech he will and won’t let through.

The second reason relates to Twitter’s tenuous role in preserving an established national elite in an age in which the very idea of such an elite is dying. Twitter has in recent years, just like the internet itself,  bifurcated into two broad strata: a national “overculture” of elites — academic, celebrity, political, or journalistic — and a more shadowy, disparate “underculture” of often-pseudonymous hoi polloi, who increasingly define themselves in opposition to the traditional elites.





and your argument goes right out the window


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## GURPS




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## vraiblonde

These people are keeping close track of their Twitter followers.    Reminds me of the Karma Wars.

refreshrefreshrefresh


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## Kyle

Project Veritas Leaks Audio of Twitter’s All-Hands Meeting Following Musk Takeover


James O’Keefe’s Project Veritas has released leaked audio of an internal all-hands meeting at Twitter following Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s successful takeover bid for the company. CEO Parag Agrawal attempted to calm the company’s frantic progressives, promising that the company’s censorship is “fundamental to keeping Twitter safe and growing.”

In leaked internal recordings, Project Veritas reveals Twitter employee reactions to Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s company takeover at an all-hands company meeting. The meeting reportedly lasted around 45 minutes; employees questioned board member Bret Taylor and CEO Para Agrawal about the future of the company and Musk’s motives for purchasing the platform.

Taylor began the meeting by recognizing how suddenly the situation at the firm had changed and how employees must be shocked by the quick turn of events. Taylor stated: “I also just want to acknowledge all the emotions of today. It is an emotional day.











						Project Veritas Leaks Audio of Twitter's All-Hands Meeting Following Musk Takeover
					

James O'Keefe's Project Veritas has released leaked audio of an internal all-hands meeting at Twitter following Tesla CEO Elon Musk's successful takeover bid for the company. CEO Parag Agrawal attempted to calm the company's frantic progressives, promising that the company's censorship is...




					www.breitbart.com


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## GURPS




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## GURPS




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## Bluecrqbe

Get ready with your safe spaces snowflakes

“Shadow banned, I’ve been doxxed, why am I so fat?”


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## Merlin99

vraiblonde said:


> These people are keeping close track of their Twitter followers.    Reminds me of the Karma Wars.
> 
> refreshrefreshrefresh


I kind of liked the krama wars, some of it was hilarious.


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## glhs837

And then there's this.... Looks like they are trying stain Musk already...... Expect more of this... 



			Bloomberg - Are you a robot?


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## David

GURPS said:


> Is there ANY doubt Twitter had their thumb on the scale down grading Conservatives


Outsiders can only speculate about what is going on. On the other hand, the coincidence of this happening now is certainly cause for speculation. My thoughts are that some employees were doing their own thing and now that the company has been sold, are trying to undo their bad deeds. In a company that size, all code changes will be managed by a version control system. This means that every single character in source code that was ever changed is recorded as to when, why, and by whom.

I wouldn't be surprised of some of the bot farms were being run by employees on their own time to help bolster the image of their favorite left-leaning famous Twitter users.

Elon should have his attorneys send a letter to the company to preserve all evidence.


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## David




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## David

BTW:



		Code:
	

https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1519377424437243904?s=20&t=0bmjxOX13uekpUlAHpiG6A


When you copy the Twitter link from Twitter, you get something like the above. 

The *s=* identifies the source, or type of computer you are using, e.g. PC, android, etc.

People believe the *t=* is some sort of session ID that links back to you.

*tldr; *I remove both of those parameters before I paste the link anywhere, including here.


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## Bluecrqbe

David said:


> BTW:
> 
> 
> 
> Code:
> 
> 
> https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1519377424437243904?s=20&t=0bmjxOX13uekpUlAHpiG6A
> 
> 
> When you copy the Twitter link from Twitter, you get something like the above.
> 
> The *s=* identifies the source, or type of computer you are using, e.g. PC, android, etc.
> 
> People believe the *t=* is some sort of session ID that links back to you.
> 
> *tldr; *I remove both of those parameters before I paste the link anywhere, including here.


Huh? You’re thinking way too deep into this. 

Elon is brilliant, but the man literally is running Tesla, SpaceX, the boring company, and now Twitter. You folks treat him like some engineering magician who will bend Twitter to the right. It’s not happening, I hold by my original post, he will uphold high salaries and allow wokeness to keep full talent on board, there is no market or money in right leaning social media, if there were he’d be buying Gab, Parler, or Truth. 

Watching you folks in denial is something, I literally don’t have enough popcorn. 

…yeah, the man who has built the largest electric car company supports republican positions, maybe you folks should start taking a multivitamin a day or something, the Brain is mush!!


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## Grumpy




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## Grumpy

That damn boomer...


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## Merlin99

MandyP said:


> Huh? You’re thinking way too deep into this.
> 
> Elon is brilliant, but the man literally is running Tesla, SpaceX, the boring company, and now Twitter. You folks treat him like some engineering magician who will bend Twitter to the right. It’s not happening, I hold by my original post, he will uphold high salaries and allow wokeness to keep full talent on board, there is no market or money in right leaning social media, if there were he’d be buying Gab, Parler, or Truth.
> 
> Watching you folks in denial is something, I literally don’t have enough popcorn.
> 
> …yeah, the man who has built the largest electric car company supports republican positions, maybe you folks should start taking a multivitamin a day or something, the Brain is mush!!


Is that like there’s no money in conservative media?


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## GURPS

David said:


> I wouldn't be surprised of some of the bot farms were being run by employees on their own time to help bolster the image of their favorite left-leaning famous Twitter users.




Probably ... 

The supposition has been put forth there was some ' ancillary ' code running alongside the main code like a plug in, easily removed ... that has been responsible for the banning / shadow banning conservative voices occasionally catching prominent persons ... this being for the 

whoops we did not mean to ban x


But this is all theory crafting, I am sure as we type the evidence is being removed


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## GURPS

David said:


> BTW:
> 
> *tldr; *I remove both of those parameters before I paste the link anywhere, including here.




Ditto

I noticed that a while back ... from News Outlets with embedded Tweets




https://twitter.com/USCPSC/status/1519055293765885952?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1519055293765885952%7Ctwgr%5E%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Ftwitchy.com%2Fbrettt-3136%2F2022%2F04%2F27%2Fwe-missed-lesbianvisibilityday-but-the-consumer-product-safety-commission-didnt%2F


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## GURPS

In the last 24 hours, Musk has offered criticism of Vijaya Gadde, who is currently the top lawyer and head of the content moderation division at Twitter. She was responsible for not only banning Donald Trump but also censoring the Hunter Biden laptop story. She also responded less than maturely to Musk’s takeover.

Now, in a move that intertwines multiple big stories, Musk has also responded to the fact that Russian collusion hoaxer Jim Baker, former FBI and now at Twitter, set up the meeting that Michael Sussmann used to spread the false Alfa Bank story. Sussmann is now under indictment via the John Durham special counsel.

Here are both those exchanges brought to you by a “journalist” from The Washington Post who apparently finds it really bad that Musk would call out obvious corruption regarding Twitter employees.









						Elon Musk Responds to Russian Collusion Hoaxer Currently Working at Twitter, Points to Big Changes
					

Musk is paying attention in ways some didn't think he would.




					redstate.com


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## SamSpade

If it hasn't been commented on in the thread ---

I read not long ago that a HUGE portion of Twitter accounts are fake - bots, etc.
Cleaning house before the new guy comes in would easily explain the drop in followers.

Also, being a follower of one person is not mutually exclusive of another.
If one person loses 8k followers and another does also, there's a good chance a lot of them were the SAME people, possibly ALL deleting their accounts. The only reason anyone would have noticed - since people gain and lose followers constantly - is that it happened in a very short time span, almost certainly due to Musk's buying of Twitter.

I also read that among Twitter employees, a ridiculously high percentage had donated to Democrats and Democrats only - a number close to 99%. It would not surprise me in the least if thousands of members quit because they no longer had their place in the echo chamber but had to share it with other views.


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## Merlin99

SamSpade said:


> If it hasn't been commented on in the thread ---
> 
> I read not long ago that a HUGE portion of Twitter accounts are fake - bots, etc.
> Cleaning house before the new guy comes in would easily explain the drop in followers.
> 
> Also, being a follower of one person is not mutually exclusive of another.
> If one person loses 8k followers and another does also, there's a good chance a lot of them were the SAME people, possibly ALL deleting their accounts. The only reason anyone would have noticed - since people gain and lose followers constantly - is that it happened in a very short time span, almost certainly due to Musk's buying of Twitter.
> 
> I also read that among Twitter employees, a ridiculously high percentage had donated to Democrats and Democrats only - a number close to 99%. It would not surprise me in the least if thousands of members quit because they no longer had their place in the echo chamber but had to share it with other views.


Twitter is HQ'd in San Francisco, it's probably pretty hard to find an R in the whole town.


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## GURPS

SamSpade said:


> I read not long ago that a HUGE portion of Twitter accounts are fake - bots, etc.
> Cleaning house before the new guy comes in would easily explain the drop in followers.




that does not explain the Conservative jumps ... unless the shadow banning / supression / or flat out banned accounts were suddenlyt unbanned by the 10's of 1000's


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## GURPS

“The FCC has no authority to block Elon Musk’s purchase of Twitter, and to suggest otherwise is absurd,” said Carr. “I would welcome the full FCC making it clear that we will not entertain these types of frivolous arguments.”

“The FCC has zero authority to block Musk’s purchase of Twitter,” said Carr. “And it is particularly frivolous to ask the agency to do so in the name of protecting free speech and open debate.”

Since Twitter announced its deal with Elon Musk, the left and its allies in nonprofits and the institutional media have been working themselves into a crescendo of rage over the thought of free speech returning to social media.

Far-left senator Ed Markey (D-MA) has called on the government to block the deal in the name of “algorithmic justice,” while an MSNBC host fretted that the left’s Big Tech censorship machine might be unleashed against their favored candidates. Leftist users threatened to boycott the platform, while others tried to claim that “white supremacy” is, somehow, involved.










						FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr Rejects Calls to Block Elon Musk's Twitter Takeover
					

FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr rejected calls from a leftist think tank to intervene in Elon Musk's purchase of Twitter, calling the organization's concerns "frivolous."




					www.breitbart.com


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## SamSpade

GURPS said:


> “The FCC has no authority to block Elon Musk’s purchase of Twitter, and to suggest otherwise is absurd,” said Carr. “I would welcome the full FCC making it clear that we will not entertain these types of frivolous arguments.”
> 
> “The FCC has zero authority to block Musk’s purchase of Twitter,” said Carr. “And it is particularly frivolous to ask the agency to do so in the name of protecting free speech and open debate.”
> 
> Since Twitter announced its deal with Elon Musk, the left and its allies in nonprofits and the institutional media have been working themselves into a crescendo of rage over the thought of free speech returning to social media.
> 
> Far-left senator Ed Markey (D-MA) has called on the government to block the deal in the name of “algorithmic justice,” while an MSNBC host fretted that the left’s Big Tech censorship machine might be unleashed against their favored candidates. Leftist users threatened to boycott the platform, while others tried to claim that “white supremacy” is, somehow, involved.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr Rejects Calls to Block Elon Musk's Twitter Takeover
> 
> 
> FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr rejected calls from a leftist think tank to intervene in Elon Musk's purchase of Twitter, calling the organization's concerns "frivolous."
> 
> 
> 
> 
> www.breitbart.com



It's good to know at least one agency of the government doesn't bow to whomever is in the White House or Congress.


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## glhs837

MandyP said:


> Huh? You’re thinking way too deep into this.
> 
> Elon is brilliant, but the man literally is running Tesla, SpaceX, the boring company, and now Twitter. You folks treat him like some engineering magician who will bend Twitter to the right. It’s not happening, I hold by my original post, he will uphold high salaries and allow wokeness to keep full talent on board, there is no market or money in right leaning social media, if there were he’d be buying Gab, Parler, or Truth.
> 
> Watching you folks in denial is something, I literally don’t have enough popcorn.
> 
> …yeah, the man who has built the largest electric car company supports republican positions, maybe you folks should start taking a multivitamin a day or something, the Brain is mush!!



If you look a little deeper, he seems to be all over the map, politically. Seems to think for himself and decide based on his own morals, not based on groupthink from either side. So he agrees with conservatives on some things, liberals on other things. He gets a lot of hate from a lot of liberals for things like the world hunger BS, or his stance on the pandemic. 

And you seem to think levelling the playing field means bending twitter to the right. If not putting a thumb on the scale means more conservative views, that simply means it was artificially bent left of center.


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## vraiblonde

SamSpade said:


> It's good to know at least one agency of the government doesn't bow to whomever is in the White House or Congress.



Wait a couple of days.  This guy will be attacked and mobbed, and the cultbots will start stalking his children and harassing his parents, and he will suddenly have an epiphany.


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## vraiblonde

‘A**hole’: Twitter Employees Melt Down, Quit Over Musk Takeover, New Internal Messages Reveal: Report | The Daily Wire
					






					www.dailywire.com


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## SamSpade

vraiblonde said:


> Wait a couple of days.  This guy will be attacked and mobbed, and the cultbots will start stalking his children and harassing his parents, and he will suddenly have an epiphany.



I am still - I don't even know the word - astonished, flabbergasted - that an on air pundit commented that Musk could shut down all input from people from another party - lock out all information - block or ban members he didn' like - even change the outcome of an election.

I still can't stop laughing. Either it was meant in jest, or the person who said it is almost too clueless to live.


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## RoseRed

SamSpade said:


> I am still - I don't even know the word - astonished, flabbergasted - that an on air pundit commented that Musk could shut down all input from people from another party - lock out all information - block or ban members he didn' like - even change the outcome of an election.
> 
> I still can't stop laughing. Either it was meant in jest, or the person who said it is almost too clueless to live.


It's been stated by a few.  UFB.  Another parallel universe.


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## GURPS




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## David

MandyP said:


> Huh? You’re thinking way too deep into this.



Well, I'll Huh? your "Huh?"

I think you missed the point, which was: If you don't want the Twitter machine tracking where you post links -- and further allowing them to build a profile of you and your life --- remove the tracking code from the links before you post it somewhere. 

For example, If I were logged in to my Twitter account and copied a link to a Tweet and posted it here, Twitter can now associate my forums' account here with my Twitter account. I don't want that.


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## David

*OMG!*


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## HemiHauler

David said:


> Well, I'll Huh? your "Huh?"
> 
> I think you missed the point, which was: If you don't want the Twitter machine tracking where you post links -- and further allowing them to build a profile of you and your life --- remove the tracking code from the links before you post it somewhere.
> 
> For example, If I were logged in to my Twitter account and copied a link to a Tweet and posted it here, Twitter can now associate my forums' account here with my Twitter account. I don't want that.


I'd think that's just a thin veneer of protection though. Certainly if you're using the app, they know when you click that "share" button and which link/URL you're copying to your clipboard or share to others.


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## David

HemiHauler said:


> Certainly if you're using the app, they know when you click that "share" button and which link/URL you're copying to your clipboard or share to others.


Of course. The point is that I don't want them tying my Twitter account to my off-Twitter activity. The only way they know WHERE I posted the link is if I keep the t= parameter on the link.


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## GURPS

Suddenly, the federal government is very interested in Section 230 reform. The message to Elon Musk is simple: do what we say, or we will regulate, destroy, or take over your company if we have to, and make the purchase of Twitter the biggest waste of your entire life.

All of the worst people in the world are on board with hating Elon Musk, too. It’s virtually identical to the hate mobs that spawned on command for Donald Trump. Hilariously, Elon Musk hasn’t really even done anything yet, and in general does work that leftists would normally love. But now they suddenly hate “billionaires” and “oligarchy” again when it is commanded of them. The Ukiesexual people live by the friend/enemy distinction. All it took was for him to even suggest that “wokism” has gone too far (which is obvious to literally everyone), and their Schmittian sensors activated.

Indeed, Elon Musk has not done anything yet. The big hurdle is not actually the purchase of Twitter. Elon Musk sponsors Twitter now - so what? Now, he must actually _control_ it, which means forcing the personnel employed at Twitter to execute his bidding. Lots of capital and big purchases alone do not unseat the managers - usurping their role as decision-makers does.

All of my readers will know that free speech as a concept doesn’t make any sense at all. The conservative right and rightists with mental disabilities other than conservatism are laser-focused on Musk’s intentions regarding free speech, but this is boring and un-insightful. What will be really interesting is when (if) Musk actually asserts control over Twitter, which he can only do by becoming personally involved and responsible for the decisions made at the company - which does appear to be the way he elects to manage Tesla and SpaceX, and I presume, The Boring Company. If Musk actually uses power at Twitter, ruthlessly if necessary, then it will be a small reversal of the managerial revolution, with the capitalist class actually striking a blow against the managers. In this sense, Musk would thereby be a dissenting elite by virtue of being outside of the ruling class (the managers). This type of elite is exactly what is needed to defeat the current governing elite – it is when the elites are in contention with one another that their abuses of us are tempered, and even better, the possibility of the ruling elite being replaced entirely can emerge. Musk could be the one-off, or he could be the start of something very interesting.










						Elon Musk Buys Twitter
					

Meandering thoughts of the meaning of Twitter.




					charlemagne.substack.com


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## GURPS

Twitter Earnings Report WAS BAD Proving Elon Musk CORNERED The Company, Left FURIOUS Over Elon Memes​


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## GURPS

Senate Dems considering calling Elon Musk to testify on Twitter buy​

Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., told Bloomberg in an interview published Thursday: "We’re thinking about" the possibility of hearings. 

The Senate Commerce Committee, which Cantwell is Chair, has held hearings with former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, and Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai. 

Commerce Committee member Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass., called Twitter "central to democracy and our economy." 

"We have to understand the censorship or lack thereof, content moderation or not, that is going to be the policy for the new owner," Markey told Bloomberg. 

Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., said there was a "powerful imperative" to ask Musk to testify about his plans with Twitter and address lawmakers’ concerns. 






Umm Tell them to piss off


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## Kyle

Liberals melt down after Musk claims the Democrat Party was ‘hijacked by extremists'​
'It's now 100% clear that Musk is part of the GOP propaganda apparatus'​








						Liberals melt down after Musk claims the Democrat Party was ‘hijacked by extremists'
					

Elon Musk claimed that the Democrat Party has been "hijacked by extremists" and leftists could not handle the criticism.




					www.foxnews.com
				











I've been saying this for a long time.  Their is no Extreme Right.  The left has just gone so far bat#### crazy extreme that everybody that hasn't moved is further away.


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## GURPS

The Overton Window has shifted


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## GURPS




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## Merlin99

GURPS said:


> Suddenly, the federal government is very interested in Section 230 reform. The message to Elon Musk is simple: do what we say, or we will regulate, destroy, or take over your company if we have to, and make the purchase of Twitter the biggest waste of your entire life.
> 
> All of the worst people in the world are on board with hating Elon Musk, too. It’s virtually identical to the hate mobs that spawned on command for Donald Trump. Hilariously, Elon Musk hasn’t really even done anything yet, and in general does work that leftists would normally love. But now they suddenly hate “billionaires” and “oligarchy” again when it is commanded of them. The Ukiesexual people live by the friend/enemy distinction. All it took was for him to even suggest that “wokism” has gone too far (which is obvious to literally everyone), and their Schmittian sensors activated.
> 
> Indeed, Elon Musk has not done anything yet. The big hurdle is not actually the purchase of Twitter. Elon Musk sponsors Twitter now - so what? Now, he must actually _control_ it, which means forcing the personnel employed at Twitter to execute his bidding. Lots of capital and big purchases alone do not unseat the managers - usurping their role as decision-makers does.
> 
> All of my readers will know that free speech as a concept doesn’t make any sense at all. The conservative right and rightists with mental disabilities other than conservatism are laser-focused on Musk’s intentions regarding free speech, but this is boring and un-insightful. What will be really interesting is when (if) Musk actually asserts control over Twitter, which he can only do by becoming personally involved and responsible for the decisions made at the company - which does appear to be the way he elects to manage Tesla and SpaceX, and I presume, The Boring Company. If Musk actually uses power at Twitter, ruthlessly if necessary, then it will be a small reversal of the managerial revolution, with the capitalist class actually striking a blow against the managers. In this sense, Musk would thereby be a dissenting elite by virtue of being outside of the ruling class (the managers). This type of elite is exactly what is needed to defeat the current governing elite – it is when the elites are in contention with one another that their abuses of us are tempered, and even better, the possibility of the ruling elite being replaced entirely can emerge. Musk could be the one-off, or he could be the start of something very interesting.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Elon Musk Buys Twitter
> 
> 
> Meandering thoughts of the meaning of Twitter.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> charlemagne.substack.com




So as far as the dept of disinformation goes it should follow the legal system, “better a thousand guilty men go free than to lock up one innocent”.


----------



## my-thyme




----------



## GURPS




----------



## GURPS

Sen. Ed Markey (D-MA), who sits on the Commerce Committee, emphasized the importance of learning about Twitter’s potential censorship and moderation policies under Musk’s management.

“It’s a technology which is central to democracy and our economy and it is important for the representatives of the American people to hear what the new owners intend on using that technology to accomplish,” Markey told Bloomberg. “We have to understand the censorship or lack thereof, content moderation or not, that is going to be the policy for the new owner.”

“In terms of what the values are that this company is going to be creating for the new Elon Musk Twitter world, I think that’s actually a necessary role for Congress to play,” he added.

*Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) said, “there is a powerful imperative to ask [Musk] to tell Congress and the American people how he’s going to address the concerns that we’ve raised.”*











						Senate Democrats Consider Hauling Elon Musk In For Questioning Over Twitter Buyout | The Daily Wire
					






					www.dailywire.com
				






Umm Go Fork Yourself


----------



## glhs837




----------



## TPD

So if I decide to buy The Enterprise, do I have to go before Congress to explain how I intend to change it to more conservative?


----------



## Grumpy

TPD said:


> So if I decide to buy The Enterprise, do I have to go before Congress to explain how I intend to change it to more conservative?


Well, you do have a rep...so probably


----------



## phreddyp

glhs837 said:


> If you look a little deeper, he seems to be all over the map, politically. Seems to think for himself and decide based on his own morals, not based on groupthink from either side. So he agrees with conservatives on some things, liberals on other things. He gets a lot of hate from a lot of liberals for things like the world hunger BS, or his stance on the pandemic.
> 
> And you seem to think levelling the playing field means bending twitter to the right. If not putting a thumb on the scale means more conservative views, that simply means it was artificially bent left of center.


I agreed with you, but just so you understand he is what is called an "Independent" . Which is basically ignored by everyone like they don't exist. I registered as unaffiliated in Maryland in 1972 because Independent wasn't one of the choices .


----------



## GURPS

Zurawik: 'We Are Headed to Hell' If Congress Doesn't Regulate Musk​
*“I think there's a bigger problem that when we focus on the personalities of people like Elon Musk,”* Zurawik said before complaining that there's too much focus on speculating over what Musk is thinking or what his intentions are for the social media platform that he recently purchased: 



> There's a bigger problem here about how we are going to control the channels of communication in this country. In 1927, we had The Radio Act, 1934 The Communications Act. Congress stepped in. We made rules. FCC wasn't great but it's still regulating the broadcast industry. You can't use vulgar language, you can’t do all of these things with speech.




Zurawik wailed that *“we gave over what amounts to our airwaves or our internet waves to Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk, and we are in so much trouble because those guys believe in making money.”* Yet Zurawik and his media allies apparently have no problem with their billionaires buying media companies like the _Washington Post_.

“*We've already seen that with the 2016 election, and Zuckerberg, when he was taking rubles for ads from Russia,” *Zurawik huffed and claimed, *“Musk is the same.”* 

Becoming more and more unhinged, Zurawik cried: *“This is dangerous. We can't think anymore in this country.”* This caused host Brian Stelter to audibly laugh. 

*“No, I'm serious,”* Zurawik insisted. *“We don't have people in Congress who can make regulations, that can make it work. I think we can look to the western countries in Europe for how they are trying to limit it but you need -- you need controls on this. You need regulation.”*

Ending his rage-filled tirade Zurawik whined: *“You cannot let these guys control discourse in this country or we are headed to hell. We are there. Trump opened the gates of hell and now they're chasing us down.”*


----------



## glhs837

phreddyp said:


> I agreed with you, but just so you understand he is what is called an "Independent" . Which is basically ignored by everyone like they don't exist. I registered as unaffiliated in Maryland in 1972 because Independent wasn't one of the choices .



Independent like I've been for a couple of decades now? Yep, got it.


----------



## Kyle

AOC Says She Got Killed From Elon Buying Twitter And Is Now Dead

WASHINGTON, D.C.—Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez was brutally murdered this week as a result of Elon Musk buying Twitter, says AOC. Twitter accepted Musk's offer to buy Twitter on April 25th, which AOC says makes them an accessory to her murder.

"I have never been more dead than I am right now," said AOC while attending a disinformation fundraiser. "A privileged white man violently assaulted me by legally buying Twitter and defending free speech! He literally cut off my head and now I am dead!"

"She's right over there," Musk allegedly told authorities. "Just turn your head."

AOC has claimed Musk's words are disinformation of the worst sort and have caused her to experience a second death.

"That makes him double guilty!" she wept.











						AOC Says She Got Killed From Elon Buying Twitter And Is Now Dead
					

WASHINGTON, D.C.—Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez was brutally murdered this week as a result of Elon Musk buying Twitter, says AOC. Twitter accepted Musk's offer to buy Twitter on April 25th, which AOC says makes them an accessory to her murder.




					babylonbee.com


----------



## GURPS

‘Plainly Un-American:’ FCC Commissioner Shoots Down Leftist Calls To Stop Elon Musk Buying Twitter​

He pointed out several examples of this structure: The New York Times is operated by Chairman A.G. Sulzberger, who inherited the position from his father Arthur Sulzberger; The Washington Post is owned by Jeff Bezos’ holding company Nash Holdings; Google and its parent company Alphabet are run by CEO Sundar Pichai; Facebook and its parent company Meta are operated by Mark Zuckerberg, who is the founder, chairman, CEO, and controlling shareholder of both.

Simington also noted that vertical integration in online media companies is widespread, and there are multiple examples of individuals or companies owning or controlling both broadband internet providers as well as online services like search engines, streaming platforms, and news sites. Furthermore, Simington said that concerns about Elon Musk owning both Twitter and Starlink “could not be taken seriously,” since Starlink currently provides broadband internet to less than 1% of Americans.

Simington also rejected other calls for the federal government to stop Musk from “enshrining free expression on Twitter.” Previously, several Democratic members of Congress and left-wing commentators lamented Musk’s buyout of Twitter, and called for regulation to stop the flow of “disinformation” and “hate.”

“[I’m] concerned his personal views will stop the fight against disinformation on social media,” Democratic California Rep. Adam Schiff tweeted last week.  “The problem on Twitter hasn’t been too much content moderation – it’s too much hate.”

[clip]

“The only merit in such proposals is their candor in proposing something so blatantly illegal,” Simington said in response to those calls. “The law in this country does not recognize a government interest in restricting the open exchange of ideas. Labeling content as “fake news” or “disinformation” does not change that. It would be not only unconstitutional, but plainly un-American, for any arm of the government to act against Twitter or Mr. Musk for such a purpose.”


----------



## GURPS

Elon Musk asks: Who is funding organizations pressuring Twitter advertisers to stop?​

Unfortunately for the haters, Elon Musk is very savvy about using Twitter. He’s exhibited a superpower level of using Twitter to clap back on critics and the nastiness aimed at him personally as well as his financial success. Musk has 90.7 million followers on Twitter. For comparison, Joe Biden has 21.8 million followers, George Soros has 349,000 followers, Jesse Lehrich has 59,000. Why did I include Soros and Lehrich? Because they are linked with the push against Musk. Lehrich is a former foreign policy adviser to Hillary Clinton. He interned for the Obama campaign in 2008 and worked for the anti-Trump American Bridge PAC. So, when Musk began to ask questions about dark money and who is funding the pressure on corporate advertisers on Twitter, eyebrows were raised.



> Some of the most high-profile liberal figures have joined together to encourage advertisers to boycott Twitter if Elon Musk brings in his promised policy of unfettered ‘free speech.’
> Twenty six NGOs and advocacy groups signed a letter expressing concern about the world’s richest man’s plan.
> Musk himself responded to the letter asking who funded them: the answer being an assortment of ‘dark money groups’ like George Soros’s Open Society Foundation; NGOs founded by former Clinton and Obama administration staffers; wealthy Democrat donors and their family foundations; labor unions; and the governments of European nations.



The letter makes clear with the first demand that it’s really all about their fear that Trump will be reinstated on Twitter. Trump has said he’s not interested in returning to Twitter but that could change. The left cannot let the former president go, he consumes their thoughts 24/7 and they are crippled by that weakness. The signers of the letter claim that Musk’s takeover of Twitter will “further toxify our information ecosystem and be a direct threat to public safety, especially among those already most vulnerable and marginalized.”


----------



## GURPS




----------



## glhs837

And the Times thinks Musk should have done SOMETHING about apartheid as a teen... 

@UglyBear  we're holding you responsible for not ending the Soviet Union as a boy. Evidently that's the new standard.  









						New York Times ‘hit piece’ on Elon Musk’s South Africa past gets blowback
					

The New York Times was blasted on Thursday for running a “hit piece” suggesting that Elon Musk’s childhood in apartheid South Africa made him indifferent to racism and that it cou…




					nypost.com


----------



## GURPS




----------



## Kyle




----------



## DaSDGuy

Kyle said:


> AOC Says She Got Killed From Elon Buying Twitter And Is Now Dead
> 
> WASHINGTON, D.C.—Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez was brutally murdered this week as a result of Elon Musk buying Twitter, says AOC. Twitter accepted Musk's offer to buy Twitter on April 25th, which AOC says makes them an accessory to her murder.
> 
> "I have never been more dead than I am right now," said AOC while attending a disinformation fundraiser. "A privileged white man violently assaulted me by legally buying Twitter and defending free speech! He literally cut off my head and now I am dead!"
> 
> "She's right over there," Musk allegedly told authorities. "Just turn your head."
> 
> AOC has claimed Musk's words are disinformation of the worst sort and have caused her to experience a second death.
> 
> "That makes him double guilty!" she wept.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> AOC Says She Got Killed From Elon Buying Twitter And Is Now Dead
> 
> 
> WASHINGTON, D.C.—Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez was brutally murdered this week as a result of Elon Musk buying Twitter, says AOC. Twitter accepted Musk's offer to buy Twitter on April 25th, which AOC says makes them an accessory to her murder.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> babylonbee.com


The least Musk can do is pay for her cremation, as long as it happens this week.


----------



## GURPS




----------



## GURPS

Elon Musk declares 'Twitter has a strong left wing bias' as he responds to tweet by reporter calling for violence against anti-abortion groups​

Elon Musk said Twitter has a 'strong left wing bias' in response to a tweet from a reporter who called for violence against pro-lifers.

Musk's comments on Monday were in reply to a tweet from Mike Cernovich, who is a conspiracy theorist known for his propagation of the baseless Pizzagate theory that high ranking democrats were running a pedophilic sex-trafficking ring out of a D.C. pizza shop.

Cernovich tagged Musk in a tweet accusing the platform of allowing verified accounts to incite violence in the name of liberal causes on Sunday evening.


----------



## GURPS




----------



## GURPS

Twitter Fires Two Executives As Elon Musk Takes Over Company​
Twitter fired two executives Thursday, forcing the general manager and the revenue and product lead out of work in advance of Elon Musk’s planned takeover.

Kayvon Beykpour, who was a manager at Twitter for seven years, took to Twitter to share updates with his followers. Referencing Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal, Beykpour said he “asked me to leave after letting me know that he wants to take the team in a different direction,” according to The Associated Press.  Bruce Falck was also let go, and took a different approach with his social media messaging, simply changing his Twitter bio to read, “unemployed,” reported the outlet.


----------



## GURPS




----------



## GURPS

Elon Musk Says Twitter Deal ‘Cannot Move Forward’ Until CEO Proves One Thing​
Musk responded Tuesday to a tweet claiming “Musk may be looking for a better Twitter deal as $44 billion seems too high with 20% of users being fake or spam accounts.”

“20% fake/spam accounts, while 4 times what Twitter claims, could be *much* higher,” Musk tweeted. “My offer was based on Twitter’s SEC filings being accurate. Yesterday, Twitter’s CEO publicly refused to show proof of <5%.”


----------



## GURPS

Busted: Biden’s “Minster of Truth” Nina Jankowicz Participated in Secret NATO-Funded Cabal to Subvert Western Democracies Using Disinformation as Cover


As Revolver and others have covered, Nina “Moaning Myrtle” Jankowicz is a joke. The Harry Potter superfan-turned-propagandrix is now the Biden Administration’s chosen head for the “Disinformation Governance Board.” Among many other embarrassing videos in circulation is the following clip of Nina Jankowicz bizarrely and emphatically dismissing the notion of the so-called “deep state.”





Whatever one thinks of the precise term “deep state,” Nina badly wants everyone to dismiss the very concept of secret groups operating within Washington. She works “with and around” them after all, and she says such a cabal or network of cabals does not exist.

In fact, Nina does know the truth, and it’s the opposite of what she claims above. Nina’s name appeared in one of the most explosive and aggressively censored national security leaks of the century. The leak in question exposed the “Integrity Initiative,” a dark government-funded NGO that appears to have engaged in political meddling and covert influence operations in Western countries under the guise of fighting “disinformation.”


Founded in mid-2015 under the auspices of the U.K. government-funded NGO “Institute for Statecraft,” the Integrity Initiative boasted a precociously fashionable motto: “Defending Democracy Against Disinformation.”









The Integrity Initiative “defended democracy” by recruiting secretive “clusters” of academics, national security bureaucrats, journalists, think tankers, and lobbyists in multiple European countries. These clusters would then be engaged in various ways to address nation-specific threats of so-called “Russian disinformation.”











						Busted: Biden's "Minster of Truth" Nina Jankowicz Participated in Secret NATO-Funded Cabal to Subvert Western Democracies Using Disinformation as Cover - Revolver News
					

Biden's almost-Minister of Truth Nina Jankowicz was part of a sinister NATO-funded globalist cabal she says doesn't exist. Busted!




					www.revolver.news


----------



## GURPS

Twitter Agrees to Pay $150 Million FTC Fine for Using Two Factor Authentication as Ruse to Sell Targeted User Data to Advertisers​

Two-Factor authentication has always been a platform ruse for gathering data on platform users.  Twitter was just one company amid a large number of on-line platforms who pushed “two factor authentication” as a security measure.  The real motive of TFA was to gain the user cell phone number in order to gain more specific information about the user.


Today multiple media outlets are reporting the FTC and Twitter have agreed to a settlement where Twitter will pay a $150 million settlement for violating user privacy and selling user data.  Twitter collected cell phone and email account information for users under the auspices of user security.  However, Twitter actually planned to use the cell phone and email data to sell a more comprehensive package of user identification to advertisers.

_(Reuters) – […] The company will pay $150 million as part of the settlement announced by the Justice Department and the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). In addition to the monetary settlement, the agreement requires Twitter to improve its compliance practices.

The complaint said that the misrepresentations violated the FTC Act and a 2011 settlement with the agency.

“Specifically, while Twitter represented to users that it collected their telephone numbers and email addresses to secure their accounts, Twitter failed to disclose that it also used user contact information to aid advertisers in reaching their preferred audiences,” the complaint said.

[…]  “Twitter obtained data from users on the pretext of harnessing it for security purposes but then ended up also using the data to target users with ads,” said FTC Chair Lina Khan in a statement. “This practice affected more than 140 million Twitter users, while boosting Twitter’s primary source of revenue.”

The complaint also alleges that Twitter falsely said it complied with the European Union-U.S. and Swiss-U.S. Privacy Shield Frameworks, which bar companies from using data in ways that consumers do not authorize.

Twitter’s settlement follows years of fallout over the privacy practices of tech companies.

Revelations in 2018 that Facebook, the world’s biggest social network, was using phone numbers provided for two-factor authentication to serve ads enraged privacy advocates.

Facebook, now called Meta (FB.O), similarly settled with the FTC over the issue as part of a $5 billion agreement reached in 2019. (read more)_


----------



## GURPS

Leaked internal messages show Twitter employees debating whether to ban us​

The below Slack conversation between Twitter employees occurred today against this backdrop, and echoes some of the charges leveled at us by far left activists. It was shared with us by a Twitter employee, who wishes to remain anonymous. We verified the names and images of the employees before we obscured them.















There are a few tweeps (that’s what Twitter employees call themselves) involved in this exchange. As you can see, they’re weighing the pros and cons of banning us. One of them expresses concern that a ban will only validate the charge that Twitter is biased against conservatives.

The reference to Trump’s “successful” deplatforming is interesting. He was permanently banned for incitement to violence — the same charge the Left hopes will stick to us.


----------



## GURPS

SFGate magazine ran an article yesterday headlined, “Twitter, Headquartered in San Francisco, Announces Mass Layoffs Amid Alleged Elon Musk Crisis.” Apparently, the deal with Musk is on hold, if not on life support, and meanwhile the social media giant seems to be having trouble making ends meet.

The news is that Twitter laid off a third of its “talent recruitment team,” which I think is just a fun way of describing the human resources department. This follows news of a hiring freeze announced back in May. A company spokesperson told SFGATE that the newest layoffs are just a way for the company to “refocus its business needs” during a “lean period.”

One possible read is that Twitter was already on the ropes back when Musk made his offer, and its board saw the deal as a lifeline, so they could dump a crashing company on the next sucker, but the canny billionaire figured it out after reviewing their financials before taking possession. Maybe.

But I can’t help but think of another article I saw recently in Blaze Media, headlined, “Exposé Reveals Twitter, Other Social Media Platforms Routinely Hire Former Feds: It’s a ‘Revolving Door.’”

The story explains that tiny MintPress News has just released an investigative report on hiring practices in Silicon Valley, particularly at Twitter, finding that many social media companies have filled some of their most influential positions with former members of federal agencies, especially the intelligence services, including the FBI, CIA, and the military.

So. Weird.

Former FBI agent and whistleblower Coleen Rowley told Mintpress that there’s now a “revolving door” between federal agents and the companies they are supposed to be policing. And it’s not just the U.S.’s federal government. In 2019, news broke that Gordon Macmillan, Twitter’s editorial head for Europe, Middle East, and Africa, was a current member of the British Army’s notorious 77th Brigade, which is “dedicated to online warfare and psychological operations.”

Gosh. Who could have predicted this unlikely turn of events?

So, another read on the shrinking “talent team” is that Twitter doesn’t NEED recruiters anymore. They have so many CIA, FBI, NSA, and foreign intelligence agents wanting to work there, they don’t even have to advertise, much less do interviews and stuff.

We need to come up with a new, more descriptive name for Twitter. Or maybe a different logo. Instead of the little bluebird, think about a stool pigeon or something. Maybe one of our graphic artists can come up with something good for them.

And we need a better term than “regulatory capture.” This trend is a kind of reverse regulatory capture, where government agencies capture businesses.










						☕️ Coffee & Covid ☙ Friday, July 8, 2022 ☙ PAIN RX 🦠
					

Another Trump ally assassinated; Twitter hires feds, fires recruiters; 20 states ban Zuckerbucks; Uruguay judge halts jabs for kids; Fed forecasts ‘some pain’; bad polls for Dems; much more ...




					www.coffeeandcovid.com


----------



## Kyle




----------



## Gilligan

I never got a Twitter account. Guess I never will.


----------



## GURPS

Elon Musk Terminates Twitter Purchase Deal, Citing Material Breach of Agreement by Company Refusing to Provide Access to Data​


It appears that Twitter Inc did not want to reveal how Jack’s Magic Coffee Shop was able to sustain operations, at an extremely high cost, without making money.   That’s the essential source of the issue.

The social media company did not want anyone looking at the data stream inside the communication platform.   Musk was not allowed to authenticate the number of real users and identify the number of ‘spam’ or ‘bot’ accounts within the platform.

From the SEC Letter: […] ” Specifically, in the Merger Agreement, Twitter represented that no documents that Twitter filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission since January 1, 2022, included any “untrue statement of a material fact” (Section 4.6(a)). Twitter has repeatedly made statements in such filings regarding the portion of its mDAUs that are false or spam, including statements that: “We have performed an internal review of a sample of accounts and estimate that the average of false or spam accounts during the first quarter of 2022 represented fewer than 5% of our mDAU during the quarter,” and “After we determine an account is spam, malicious automation, or fake, we stop counting it in our mDAU, or other related metrics.”

Mr. Musk relied on this representation in the Merger Agreement (and Twitter’s numerous public statements regarding false and spam accounts in its publicly filed SEC documents) when agreeing to enter into the Merger Agreement. Mr. Musk has the right to seek rescission of the Merger Agreement in the event these material representations are determined to be false.

Although Twitter has not yet provided complete information to Mr. Musk that would enable him to do a complete and comprehensive review of spam and fake accounts on Twitter’s platform, he has been able to partially and preliminarily analyze the accuracy of Twitter’s disclosure regarding its mDAU. While this analysis remains ongoing, all indications suggest that several of Twitter’s public disclosures regarding its mDAUs are either false or materially misleading.


----------



## GURPS




----------



## GURPS

Finally! Yesterday, a Louisiana federal judge ordered Joe Biden, federal agencies, and Twitter to turn over records showing government collaboration with Twitter about “disinformation,” which would be a clear violation of the First Amendment. The government isn’t allowed to interfere with free speech — even indirectly. It’s not a minor case, either — the plaintiff is the State of Missouri.

This case is long overdue.













						☕️ Coffee & Covid ☙ Wednesday, July 13, 2022 ☙ IT’S DOOMSDAY AGAIN 🦠
					

Electoral doomsday for dems; an nuclear-level fear-porn PSA in NYC; cracks in the Ukraine alliance; judge orders discovery into federal Twitter meddling; New Zealand covid numbers; and much more...




					www.coffeeandcovid.com


----------



## GURPS

Physician Threatens To Sue Twitter Over Suspension For Tweeting Scientific Article On COVID-19 Vaccine Lowering Sperm Counts (UPDATED)​
Andrew Bostom has retained the attorney who represented Alex Berenson in his lawsuit that resulted in his return to Twitter: “Dr. Bostom did not violate Twitter’s policy…. We trust that our client will not have to resort to the courts, and that Twitter will reinstate his account as requested .”



Bostom explained that his tweet was an accurate reflection of the Israeli study as described in the linked scientific article, so Twitter’s claim that he shared “false or misleading information” was itself false and misleading:



> Again, quoting their publication, *verbatim*, based upon what *the authors defined*, _a priori_, as the primary statistical analysis (i.e., “ _[a] 1) generalized estimated equation model (GEE) was used for repeated measures analysis,”_ which is indeed the most appropriate method!):
> _ “sperm concentration was significantly lower due to decrease of -15.4% (confidence interval -25.5%–3.9%) compared to [Time zero/baseline] T0 (p=0.01). Moreover, [total motile count; how sperm moved] TMC percentage change reduction of 22.1% was significantly lower compared to T0 (confidence interval -35% – -6.6%, p=0.007) as well. Although concentration and TMC were reduced also on T3, these values did not reach statistical significance.”_
> If anything the text of my 6/19/22 tweet *understated* the evidence of a possible longer term, ~ 5-month follow-up decline, calling it a “rebound” when “_concentration and TMC were *reduced also* on T3, [though] these values did not reach statistical significance.”_ In other words, the trend was toward a persistent decline, although it did not “_reach statistical significance_,” but may well have been evident, and “statistically significant,” merely by studying more subjects.
> Finally, my offending tweet added the truthful observation that no data were presented on the effects of booster vaccinations, and asked whether boostering might cause another cycle of decline in the sperm counts and functional measures only studied in relation to the initial vaccination.
> My suspension is yet another example of Twitter’s arbitrary, Lysenkoist breaches of informed public discourse on covid-19. The suspension must be reversed, and my account restored fully intact, immediately.


----------



## GURPS

Twitter resumes purge of scientists, critics of gender ideology after Musk pullout​

While it has publicly demanded Musk complete the deal, Twitter could also try to compel him to pay the $1 billion back-out penalty if it wanted to preserve its flexibility to crack down on purported COVID-19 misinformation, abusive behavior and "hateful conduct."

Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton, suspended for several months for calling hydroxychloroquine a "safe drug," said he noticed a "remarkable uptick in followers" to his account after Musk announced his intended purchase.

"I think Twitter is nervous" following its legal settlement with newly reinstated former New York Times journalist Alex Berenson, who showed "Twitter wasn't even following its own rules," Fitton told Just the News.

The number of spam accounts is "just a subset" of potential fraud, as evidenced by Twitter's alleged refusal to disclose information about its suspension processes during Musk's due diligence, according to Fitton.

"They're lying to Congress," shareholders, regulators and users, he alleged.

Ivy League epidemiologist Andrew Bostom woke up Wednesday to learn his account had been suspended for the second time in a month for purported COVID misinformation.

Twitter had reinstated Bostom hours after receiving a July 14 legal warning letter from former Trump administration lawyer James Lawrence, who also represented Berenson and recently added deplatformed user Daniel Kotzin as a client.


----------



## GURPS

Twitter threatened with class-action suit for censoring doctors who question COVID vaccines​
But with federal acknowledgments that the vaccines play only a marginal role in mitigating COVID infection and transmission, and emerging evidence that their protections against hospitalization and death were oversold, the corporations are facing potential legal challenge, with repercussions for their bottom lines.

One Ivy League epidemiologist is predicting insurers will go after vaccine makers for misleading them about "all-cause mortality" in clinical trials, while another told Just the News his lawyer will soon threaten to file a class-action suit against Twitter.

Andrew Bostom, a longtime member of the Brown University medical faculty until last year, said he would be the named plaintiff in such a suit. He was suspended by Twitter twice in a month for sharing research on vaccine side effects.

Genomics researcher Kevin McKernan, who has endured repeated lockouts for questioning the evidence behind COVID vaccine claims, told Just the News he's deciding between two attorneys, including former FDA Chief Counsel James Lawrence, who's representing Bostom and previously got journalist Alex Berenson reinstated through litigation.

"Engaging [Twitter] before I'm actually banned will likely lack standing" to sue, McKernan wrote in an email. "Also keeping a close eye on Andrew Bostom." Twitter didn't respond to queries about the legal threats.

Twitter also recently suspended MIT senior research scientist Stephanie Seneff, who studies "the role of nutrition and environmental toxicants on human disease." She's the corresponding author on a new peer-reviewed paper on "innate immune suppression" by mRNA COVID vaccines.


----------



## GURPS

Elon Musk Response to Twitter Lawsuit Shares Some Inconvenient Facts About Spam Bots​

What did Musk’s analysis find? He says the data shows there are twice as many spam bots as Twitter claims there are: [emphasis mine]




> Based on that analysis, Musk alleges that during the first week of July, spam bots accounted for 33% of visible accounts on the platform and *about 10%* of Twitter’s monetizable daily active users, or mDAU. (Twitter, for its part, has consistently reported that spam and fake bot accounts make up *less than 5%* of its mDAU.)



Musk also writes that Twitter still hasn’t given his team the full information they need to analyze “the methodology it follows to determine its mDAU count,” among other data needed to figure out the company’s value to potential advertisers. And execs might have an incentive not to help clarify things:



> “Twitter also does not publish the methodology it follows to determine its mDAU count, or how it excludes nonmonetizable accounts from that metric,” Musk’s answer states. “Thus, it is extremely difficult for any third party to completely recreate Twitter’s mDAU calculations.”
> Musk’s answer alleges Twitter leadership has incentives to report “high mDAU numbers to stoke investor interest” and because its executive compensation structure is based partly on mDAU.


----------



## GURPS




----------



## GURPS

Twitter Is Objectively Pro-Groomer​

Pro-groomer social media platform Twitter has permanently suspended the Gays Against Groomers organization from their account.


Describing themselves as “a coalition of gays against the sexualization and indoctrination of children,” Gays Against Groomers was founded earlier this year by Jaimee Michell. A gay woman who describes herself as “based” and “strayed” from woke culture, Michell has compared “gender-affirming” surgery on minors to the works of Nazi butcher Dr. Josef Mengele.


That’s probably because Michell is unafraid to speak hard truths. She told OAN last month:



> I created the coalition because, you know, there are many of us within the gay community that have been speaking out against what’s happening now to children in our name for a long time. But we never had a unified voice. We never had a unified front to really tackle this stuff head-on. So, I thought it would be a very powerful thing to do to band together and unite behind this message that we oppose it, that we don’t want anything to do with these people. And it’s very important.



I contacted Michell to find out how many followers her organization lost with the suspension, but haven’t heard back from her yet. Their backup account — however long it lasts — is here and after a few hours already has 6,400 followers. Growth of the suspended account had been described in one recent article as “viral.”


----------



## GURPS




----------



## GURPS

With the rise of pornography apps and sites like Only Fans, Twitter was presented with a way to do that. In this way, Twitter users could charge subscriptions to allow their followers to see their naughty bits for a fee. It would appear that Twitter was well into considering this option, but something happened on its site that involved a minor not long ago.


According to the The Verge, Twitter created a “Red Team” specifically designed to “to pressure-test the decision to allow adult creators to monetize on the platform, by specifically focusing on what it would look like for Twitter to do this safely and responsibly.”

What they found was that “safely and responsibly” wasn’t something that Twitter could do seeing as how the company doesn’t effectively police harmful sexual content. As The Verge reported, the Red Team found some major flaws in Twitter’s system when it comes to nudity and sex:



> “Twitter cannot accurately detect child sexual exploitation and non-consensual nudity at scale,” the Red Team concluded in April 2022. The company also lacked tools to verify that creators and consumers of adult content were of legal age, the team found. As a result, in May — weeks after Elon Musk agreed to purchase the company for $44 billion — the company delayed the project indefinitely. If Twitter couldn’t consistently remove child sexual exploitative content on the platform today, how would it even begin to monetize porn?



So Twitter shelved the project…and nothing else.

As The Verge reported, Twitter still hasn’t taken any meaningful steps to counter the problem of pornography on its website and stop the uploading of things such as child porn and revenge porn. Twitter will go above and beyond to stop speech they don’t like, but angrily uploading naked pictures of your ex or distributing underage nudes is still slipping by the censors.










						Twitter's Refusal to Take Down Child Porn Might Have Lead to Stopping Its Foray Into Its Own Porn Venture
					

Twitter's got a dark secret.




					redstate.com


----------



## GURPS




----------



## GURPS




----------



## stgislander

I would think this would help make Elon's case.


----------



## Kyle

GURPS said:


> instead the free world was infected by authoritarianism.


----------



## GURPS

Judge Shoots Down Twitter’s Attempt To Access Elon Musk’s Emails​

“Musk had ‘unrestricted’ personal use of his Tesla email account, that ‘no one’ at Tesla can access those emails without Musk’s consent or ‘to the extent legally necessary,’ and that ‘nobody’ at SpaceX can access his email account without Musk’s express consent,” McCormick remarked based on affidavits from lawyers and information technology professionals at the two companies. “These additional facts make Musk’s expectation of privacy objectively reasonable. Twitter’s motion is denied.”

Email policies at SpaceX and Tesla, however, make clear that “employees have no privacy interest in their work emails” and note that the firms “reserve the right to monitor those emails,” according to McCormick. The rule that applies to Musk, therefore, appears to be an exception.

“A cynic might doubt that Musk-specific policies exist at SpaceX and Tesla. … Still, to this jurist, the evidence rings true,” McCormick continued. “The court has little doubt that neither SpaceX nor Tesla view him as on par with other employees, that he has the power to direct operational decisions, and that nobody at either company would access his information without first obtaining his approval.”


----------



## Sneakers

Musk is now offering $44 mil to buy Twitter just to make the legal stuff go away.


----------



## HemiHauler

Sneakers said:


> Musk is now offering $44 mil to buy Twitter just to make the legal stuff go away.



Put another way: he's overpaying by a LOT (at 54.20/share) because the discovery process has already been embarrassing and his deposition would have been even more embarrassing to him.


----------



## gemma_rae

HemiHauler said:


> Put another way: he's overpaying by a LOT (at 54.20/share) because the discovery process has already been embarrassing and his deposition would have been even more embarrassing to him.


Put yet another way: Thanks for your input Mr.Hauler.

Now if you please, don't go away mad, just go away.


----------



## HemiHauler

gemma_rae said:


> Put yet another way: Thanks for your input Mr.Hauler.
> 
> Now if you please, don't go away mad, just go away.


 Make me, pig.


----------



## gemma_rae

HemiHauler said:


> Make me, pig.


Okay I will, and in your own native tongue.: Oink, oink, weeeeeee, oinkoinkoink, oink screeee, snort screee, oink oink.

That'll do Craig!


----------



## glhs837

Bet I'll end up making money on it, as will he.... I've made $140 on my 29 shares I bought not long after the announcment.


----------



## GURPS




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## GURPS




----------



## stgislander

Thank-you Spoon.  You made me laugh.


----------



## GURPS

Twitter Ramps Up Election Meddling Ahead Of Midterms With Fake Fact-Checking Program Expansion​

Twitter first rolled out Birdwatch in 2021 as a way to recruit more censors who will join in their quest to silence their political enemies. Disguised under an alias that is not “publicly associated with contributors’ Twitter accounts,” birdwatchers who deem inconvenient or damning tweets to be “misinformation” are granted the power to add their own “context” to certain tweets for all to see.

Nearly two years into the program, it’s clear that the accounts Twitter deemed worthy of “fact-checking” belong to most of the same left-wing liars who run the corporate media and publicly call for the censorship of anyone who disagrees with them.

Seeing the success Birdwatch has yielded for Twitter, whose not-so-secret goal is to memory-hole conservatives who speak the truth, the Big Tech platform is expanding the program beyond its test phase.


----------



## GURPS

Twitter Secrets​

I post a new Stossel TV video every Tuesday. Lots of people signed up to receive them, but Twitter won't send my tweets to most of them. A million people chose to follow me on Twitter, but Twitter shows my posts to only 5 or 10% of them!

Which ones? I don't know. That's secret.

I will post a link to this column, too. Ninety percent of my followers won't see it.

Twitter will bury most of my tweets deep in my followers' newsfeeds, below paid tweets, below "trending" tweets, below ... who knows what? They bury them so deep that most people never see them.

Do they bury them because some employee doesn't like me? Doesn't like libertarians? I don't know. The algorithm is secret.



Twitter's a private company and can do whatever it wants. But I wish the rules were applied consistently. I can't know if they are. The process is secret.

Twitter does carry plenty of posts from libertarians and conservatives. But their "content moderators" favor the left.

Just weeks before the last election, the New York Post reported, accurately, on the sleaze on Hunter Biden's computer. Twitter blocked the Post's account for two weeks. Twitter's CEO later called that "a mistake." But did Twitter change? We don't know.

Twitter blocks former President Donald Trump, but the Taliban's account is open.

Now Twitter's blocking some posts that criticize government's COVID policies.

How often? We don't know.


----------



## GURPS

Twitter locks staff stock accounts in anticipation of deal ​Summary by Ground News

Twitter Inc has frozen equity award accounts for employees days ahead of the deadline to close its deal with Elon Musk, Bloomberg News reported on Tuesday, a sign that the social media firm hopes the deal will be completed.


----------



## GURPS

*First Amendment Strike Force – ABC NEWS*


_When unfettered free speech upsets journalism outlets__._
The ongoing saga of Elon Musk and his prospective takeover of Twitter continues. The latest wrinkle now sees the Biden administration looking into the validity of his purchase of the company; not over anti-trust issues, just that there is the worry that a liberal-leaning social media company might be positioned in a more upright manner.

Along with this thinking is ABC News with the announcement that Musk’s takeover could lead to significant layoffs at the company. What concerns the network is that this could impact the ability to limit the expression of users, as Musk has indicated his commitment to the principle of free speech – a grave concern. Then ABC turned to an expert who lent this expert opinion on the matter, which strikes as being somewhat less than that of an expert.

-_ "'Content moderation will be a lot harder without people doing content moderation,' Zeve Sanderson, the executive director at New York University's Center for Social Media and Politics, told ABC News."_


----------



## GURPS

*ABC worried that Twitter censorship will decline*​

This isn’t about trust-busting; they are fine with Twitter as it is now, controlled by the Left. But the idea that the platform will have less censorship of ideas? Impossible!

Now ABC News is chiming in with a similar take: Elon’s plan to radically downsize Twitter’s bloated workforce to a more reasonable level will threaten “content moderation,” which is just another term for censorship.



> Over the course of a monthslong bid to purchase Twitter, Elon Musk has signaled major changes at the platform. As Musk stands poised to acquire the company in the coming weeks, the transformation appears even more far-reaching than some anticipated.
> In discussions about his plans for the company, in recent months, Musk talked about potential mass layoffs that would reduce the staff by 75%, the Washington Post reported.
> While details of the potential layoffs remain limited, the move could compromise the platform’s capacity to police false or harmful content, with ramifications that extend to social issues like election integrity, experts told ABC News.



“False or harmful content.” That is a pretty vague term. Would it include, say, all the false information that was spat out about the debunked Steele Dossier? The promotion of the 1619 project? How about the declaration by the intelligence community that the Hunter Biden laptop was Russian disinformation? Or perhaps the countless defamations of Republicans being racist, sexist, homophobic, etc.?


----------



## stgislander

Marie Harf was saying the same thing on Outnumbered last week.  She was all worried that there wouldn't be enough moderators to keep child porn off Twitter.


----------



## Kyle

stgislander said:


> Marie Harf was saying the same thing on Outnumbered last week.  She was all worried that there wouldn't be enough moderators to keep child porn off Twitter.


Dedicate a monitor to Bill Clinton and Anthony Weiner.


----------



## CPUSA

HemiHauler said:


> Make me, pig.


Gee, aren't you just an adorable little misogynist...racist...bigot...homo...


----------



## GURPS

stgislander said:


> there wouldn't be enough moderators to keep child porn off




Why, Twitter doesn't do that now


----------



## GURPS




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## GURPS




----------



## glhs837

This thread is absolutely epic. His location is now listed as Twitter HQ and is title is listed as Chief Twit


----------



## RoseRed




----------



## glhs837

RoseRed said:


>




You should have looked back one post


----------



## RoseRed

glhs837 said:


> You should have looked back one post


He was carrying a sink or something.  Not the TV.


----------



## RoseRed




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## GURPS




----------



## Sneakers

And now the mass exodus of the entitled workers.


----------



## GURPS

Sneakers said:


> And now the mass exodus of the entitled workers.


----------



## glhs837

RoseRed said:


>




I missed the edit


----------



## stgislander

I thought it wasn't final until all the money arrived in Twitter's bank account sometime tomorrow.


----------



## GURPS

Musk fired Twitter Chief Executive Parag Agrawal, Chief Financial Officer Ned Segal and legal affairs and policy chief Vijaya Gadde, according to people familiar with the matter. He had accused them of misleading him and Twitter investors over the number of fake accounts on the platform.

Agrawal and Segal were in Twitter's San Francisco headquarters when the deal closed and were escorted out, the sources added.

Musk, who also runs rocket company SpaceX, plans to become Twitter's CEO after completing the acquisition and also plans to scrap permanent bans on users, Bloomberg reported, citing a person familiar with the matter.

Twitter, Musk and the executives did not immediately respond to requests for comment.










						Musk begins his Twitter ownership with firings, declares the 'bird is freed'
					

Elon Musk has taken ownership of Twitter Inc with brutal efficiency, firing top executives but providing little clarity over how he will achieve the ambitions he has outlined for the influential social media platform.




					www.reuters.com


----------



## HemiHauler

By gord cap’n, I reckon that fat tubba lard is gonna leave his Truth Social faster than he’s dumped any of his ex whores.


----------



## GURPS

Elon Musk now in charge of Twitter, CEO and CFO have left, sources say​

Tesla CEO Elon Musk is now in charge of Twitter, CNBC has learned.

Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal and finance chief Ned Segal have left the company’s San Francisco headquarters and will not be returning, sources said.  Vijaya Gadde, the head of legal policy, trust, and safety was also fired, the Washington Post reported.

Musk had until Friday to complete his $44 billion acquisition of Twitter or face a court battle with the company.

The billionaire tweeted “the bird is freed” in an apparent reference to the takeover being completed.


----------



## Bare-ya-cuda

HemiHauler said:


> By gord cap’n, I reckon that fat tubba lard is gonna leave his Truth Social faster than he’s dumped any of his ex whores.


Made a withdrawal from your trump spank bank this morning I see.  Still obsessed with him.


----------



## Kyle

Elon Musk’s Twitter takeover makes the left lose it: ‘It’s like the gates of hell opened’

Elon Musk finally closed the $44 billion deal on Thursday, promptly firing several of Twitter's top executives


(Gutfeld Video)

Billionaire industrialist Elon Musk took over Twitter Thursday night and immediately fired several top executives, sending shockwaves throughout the social media platform.

CEO Parag Agrawal, CFO Ned Segal and head of legal policy, trust, and safety Vijaya Gadde were all fired after Musk had accused them of misleading him and investors over the number of fake accounts on the platform, a source with knowledge of the matter told FOX Business.

Editor-in-chief of The Federalist Mollie Hemingway described the firings as "An excellent start" to Musk's tenure in a tweet.











						Elon Musk’s Twitter takeover makes the left lose it: ‘It’s like the gates of hell opened’
					

Commentators shared a wide range of hot takes about the future of Twitter, one of the world's most influential platforms, under the leadership of Tesla CEO Elon Musk.




					www.foxnews.com


----------



## GURPS

Yesterday — a day earlier than pundits guessed — billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk closed the Twitter deal and now officially owns the entire social media company. Which explains the sink yesterday. His first official acts were to fire Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal, CFO Ned Segal, general counsel Sean Edgett, and the odious Vijaya Gadde, head of “trust and safety,” who permanently suspended President Trump, censored the Hunter Biden laptop story, and banned political ads from the platform.

Buh- bye.
https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch...4da6-3c73-4874-8b3f-56f95c8d6988_1104x374.png
Disgruntled lefty outlets are hoping Twitter will implode. The Atlantic ran a story yesterday fantasizing about a long list of ways the formerly-beloved social media platform could be wiped out:





Reports say Musk has asked his Tesla engineers to review the Twitter code base. I wonder why.

A couple points. First, Musk’s Twitter acquisition has already succeeded by preventing the platform from being weaponized against Republicans in the midterm elections. Second, even if Twitter doesn’t change one bit, it has probably been neutralized as a future way for leftists to influence elections.

Third, the Twitter fear-psyops are over. Finally.










						☕️ C&C NEWS ☙ Friday, October 28, 2022 ☙ THE WHOLE PLAN 🦠
					

A step-by-step plan for restoring order and bringing covid criminals to justice.




					www.coffeeandcovid.com


----------



## glhs837




----------



## Kyle

AP sources: Musk in control of Twitter, ousts top executives

AP sources: Musk in control of Twitter, ousts top executivesBy BARBARA ORTUTAY, TOM KRISHER and MATT O’BRIENAP Business WritersThe Associated Press
Elon Musk has taken control of Twitter and ousted the CEO, chief financial officer and the company’s top lawyer, two people familiar with the deal said Thursday night.

The people wouldn’t say if all the paperwork for the deal, originally valued at $44 billion, had been signed or if the deal has closed. But they said Musk is in charge of the social media platform and has fired CEO Parag Agrawal, CFO Ned Segal and Chief Legal Counsel Vijaya Gadde. Neither person wanted to be identified because of the sensitive nature of the deal.










						AP Sources: Musk in Control of Twitter, Ousts Top Executives
					

Two people familiar with the deal say that Elon Musk is in control of Twitter and has ousted the CEO, chief financial officer, and the company’s chief lawyer.




					www.breitbart.com


----------



## PJay

Hopefully MAGA's accounts are restored! They are ready to storm.





Your browser is not able to display this video.


----------



## glhs837

Man, the Tesla shareholder group was split between folks responding like us, others like CNN, and a third group just bitching about using Tesla software engineers without Twitter compensating them.... Whiny bitches.


----------



## Sneakers

glhs837 said:


> and a third group just bitching about using Tesla software engineers without Twitter compensating them...


 Tesla pays for them, regardless. And I can think of many times I was "on loan" to a different org to help resolve issues without compensation to the company. A favor now for a favor later...

Millennials dont think in terms of long term relationships.  In a gig economy, you do a job now, you get paid now.  No need for working relations.


----------



## glhs837

Sneakers said:


> Tesla pays for them, regardless. And I can think of many times I was "on loan" to a different org to help resolve issues without compensation to the company. A favor now for a favor later...



Exactly, and SpaceX and Tesla work back and forth all the time, in fact theres an open door policy between the two. Not only are there synergies, but being able to take a break and work different problems is good for the brain. One reason I love my job is that I get to solve a lot of different things.


----------



## Kyle

glhs837 said:


> Exactly, and SpaceX and Tesla work back and forth all the time, in fact theres an open door policy between the two. Not only are there synergies, but being able to take a break and work different problems is good for the brain. One reason I love my job is that I get to solve a lot of different things.


That's how I was able to come up with the solution to that whole peace in the middle east thing. 






Just need to get everyone else on board with it now.


----------



## GURPS




----------



## spr1975wshs

I wonder if Agrawal and Gadde were working there on H-1 Visas...how many others go home now, too.


----------



## Kyle




----------



## GURPS




----------



## GURPS

CNBC Journalist Duped By Pranksters Pulling ‘Internet Hoax’ Outside Of Twitter’s HQ: Report​

CNBC journalist Deirdre Bosa showed up to the offices Friday where she took a photograph of two men who were carrying boxes, claiming that they had just been fired.

“It’s happening,” Bosa tweeted. “Entire team of data engineers let go. These are two of them.”

“They are visibly shaken. Daniel tells us he owns a Tesla and doesn’t know how he’s going to make payments,” she claimed. “(To be clear – I don’t think the Tesla was top of mind, I think @elonmusk was).”








Soon after videos and images of the two men went viral on social media, reports surfaced indicating that they never worked at the company.

The most glaringly obvious problem with the story was the name of one of the two men, who identified himself as “Rahul Ligma.”

*“‘Ligma’ is, of course, also an internet hoax designed to elicit the response ‘lick my balls’ from people who are in on the joke,” The Verge reported.*


----------



## GURPS

Elon Already Digging Into Big Complaint From Conservatives, Making the Left Melt Down​




On top of that, Musk reportedly called in Tesla engineers to check out all the code. That’s very bright, to make sure there isn’t anything in there and Twitter employees were prevented from making changes so Twitter couldn’t be sabotaged.

Some of the Twitter employees have already indicated that they’re against the change, so it’s smart to account for funny business.

On top of that, now he’s also indicating he’s going to be a hands-on owner to work out one of the chief problems that many on the left have complained about — shadow banning and the suppression of their tweets. How do we know this? Elon responded to Catturd, a prominent Twitter user that he would be digging into that question more on Friday.


----------



## GURPS

Media are worried Elon Musk will actually protect free speech. Think about that for a minute.

It was bad enough for WAPo’s Taylor Lorenz to proclaim Musk taking over Twitter was like the ‘gates of Hell opening,’ but thinking about a bunch of firefighters … sorry … ‘journalists’ from the New York Times and the Washington Post gathering for a Twitter circle aka ‘safe space’ with one another takes the idea of melting down to a WHOLE new level.

What do they think is really going to happen?

C’mon.

Look at this thread …























						NYT & WaPo reporters 'digitally crap their pants' in Twitter space over Musk buying Twitter (thread)
					

Media are worried Elon Musk will actually protect free speech. Think about that for a minute.




					twitchy.com


----------



## GURPS




----------



## GURPS




----------



## GURPS




----------



## GURPS




----------



## Kyle




----------



## Kyle




----------



## GURPS

Musk says he had no role in bringing Kanye West back on Twitter​


----------



## GURPS

Is Elon Musk’s Takeover of Twitter Good or Bad For Free Speech?​ Media Industry, Elon Musk, Twitter, Social Media, Perspectives, Big Tech, Free Speech Online, Free Speech, First Amendment

AllSides Summary​Elon Musk officially took control of Twitter on Friday, beginning with a purge of several top executives. Musk has been vocal about his intentions to overhaul the operations of the platform, specifically in terms of content moderation and policing. This is sparking much discussion and speculation on what Musk’s reforms will mean for free speech, censorship, and the spread of misinformation on the platform.

*What the Right is Saying: *Voices on the right are widely welcoming Elon’s takeover, long frustrated with perceived suppression of conservative voices on the platform. The most common instance of suppression on Twitter pointed to is the deletion of a New York Post (Lean Right Bias) story about Hunter Biden in the days before the 2020 Presidential election. David Marcus called for Musk to sever ties with Twitter’s third-party fact-checkers, writing, “better that a dozen lies go unchecked than that a single important truth be hidden from the people”

*What the Left is Saying: *The left is widely opposed to the Musk takeover, with fears of unchecked misinformation and bad-actors proliferating lies a common theme. Additionally, a number of pieces are voicing fear of the growing power and influence held by Musk, who is already one of the richest individuals in the world. Richard K. Sherman, a Professor of Law at New York Law School, voiced the importance of checks on free speech in a Democratic society. He writes, “meaningful freedom requires ground rules to limit abuses that would otherwise render it a dead letter.”


----------



## GURPS

Twitter to start charging $20 a month for verification under new owner Elon Musk​



Twitter plans to start charging nearly $20 a month for users to keep their blue checkmarks as part of a premium service that will be rolled out under Elon Musk’s leadership, according to a report.

“The whole verification process is being revamped right now,” Musk, who took over as the CEO of the social media platform Friday, tweeted Sunday.

The hefty price bump is reportedly one of the revamps, The Verge reported.

The company plans to raise its optional $4.99-a-month premium subscription called Twitter Blue to $19.99 a month. However, that price is subject to change, the outlet reported, citing internal correspondence and people familiar with the matter.


----------



## GURPS

Elon Musk Tweets that Twitter Board and Law Firm Deliberately Hid Evidence from the Court – In Emails Featuring Yoel Roth​




Not only might the Twitter Board and Attorney be in trouble for lying with the court, but the these entities would be in trouble with the SEC as well for filing false statements as we reported earlier as well.

The Gateway Pundit has written about far left hack Yoel Roth in the past.

Yoel Roth was the the one to block the Hunter Biden Laptop story before the 2020 election and called Trump officials “actual Nazis.”

The guy is bad news and may have participated in illegal acts.

From our May 2022 post — Thanks to Citizen Wells.



> Twitter on Thursday announced it will put warning labels on tweets that contain so-called ‘misinformation’ in a time of war, natural disasters or pandemics.
> Yoel Roth, the woke, far-left hack behind the new policy to suppress conservatives, has a history of attacking Trump and he even blocked the Hunter Biden laptop story in an effort to influence the 2020 election.
> The Free Beacon reported:
> 
> 
> 
> Twitter’s pick to stop the spread of misinformation in times of crisis has a history of pushing falsehoods.
> Yoel Roth, the head of Twitter’s safety and integrity unit, unveiled the site’s “crisis misinformation policy” on Thursday. In a blog post, Roth outlined how Twitter will place warning labels on tweets deemed to contain misinformation and prevent them from being “amplified or recommended” in times of armed conflict, natural disasters, or public health emergencies.
> Roth is a questionable pick to launch the policy, given his own track record with misinformation. Roth oversaw Twitter’s decision to block the sharing of an October 2020 New York Post report on emails from Hunter Biden’s abandoned laptop. Roth told the Federal Election Commission he made the decision based on “rumors” shared by the United States government’s intelligence community that the Russian government might release materials hacked from Hunter Biden.
> 
> 
> 
> Roth previously ‘fact-checked’ one of President Trump’s tweets with fake news.
> Yoel Roth previously said there are “actual Nazis” in the Trump White House:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Here’s more tweets from Yoel Roth…
Click to expand...


----------



## GURPS




----------



## glhs837

The venom they spew is fine, but ask some simple questions and you are a Nazi


----------



## Kyle

glhs837 said:


> The venom they spew is fine, but ask some simple questions and you are a Nazi


Questions are violence.


----------



## GURPS




----------



## GURPS

Twitter: empire strikes back take 2​









Thierry Breton is a French business executive, politician and the current Commissioner for Internal Market of the European Union. He met with Musk earlier in the year to share his concerns about free speech on Twitter and in this Tweet reminded him that Europe has its eyes on him. You can read about the EU’s threats in my earlier post referenced above.

Here in the US the Biden Administration has been making noise about the potential national security threat a free Twitter might pose, and now a US Senator is upping the ante. The Left is absolutely in a panic about Musk “freeing the bird,” and they have been stymied by the fact that he simply doesn’t care what they think. Musk’s superpower is his indifference to the opinions of jerks, or anybody else.











Sounds dire, doesn’t it?

What Senator Murphy doesn’t tell you is that Saudi Arabia neither owns Twitter (Elon Musk does), nor does its investment in the deal change a thing from last week or last year.

Saudi Arabia’s had a stake in Twitter all along. The exact same size as now. They no more control Twitter today than they did before. Murphy didn’t care about that then, and he doesn’t really care about it now. He cares about Musk allowing conservatives a say on social media.

Murphy is doing nothing other than taking the same shot across the bow that the EU did last week. He is reminding Musk that no matter how large a player in the economy he is–and he is a big player indeed–the US government and its allies are bigger yet. He is simply saying: we can crush you if we so choose, so play ball.

Musk has become enemy #1 for the transnational elite. Ironically, I am pretty sure he never expected that to happen, because he clearly is only vaguely aware of politics and the culture, and only vaguely cares about any of that except when either becomes an obstacle to his objectives or his personal interests.


----------



## Kyle

Democrats on Capitol Hill set sights on Elon Musk’s Twitter acquisition​Sen. Chris Murphy claims Saudi Arabia may use Elon Musk's purchase to influence Twitter​









						Democrats on Capitol Hill set sights on Elon Musk’s Twitter acquisition
					

Sen. Chris Murphy is pushing President Biden's administration to investigate Elon Musk's purchase of Twitter, arguing Saudi Arabia may have an influence on the company.




					www.foxbusiness.com
				





I'm surprised it's not "Russia! Russia! Russia!"


----------



## GURPS




----------



## Sneakers

GURPS said:


>



Buh BYE!

The woke are being woken up.


----------



## GURPS

yeah run to Tribal


----------



## Kyle

Stephen King needs to be swallowed up by one of his books creepy realities.


----------



## GURPS

Kyle said:


> Stephen King needs to be swallowed up by one of his books creepy realities.




he needs to head to Tribal as well .... if I was Elon I'd be banning these progressive whiners with a link to sign up for Tribal


----------



## GURPS

Elon Musk's 'for cause' firings of Twitter execs negate multimillion-dollar payouts​
Elon Musk’s recent firing of Twitter executives is costing them millions of dollars in severance payments in his takeover of the social network.

Mr. Musk fired chief executive Parag Agrawal, chief financial officer Ned Segal, former general counsel Sean Edgett and legal affairs and policy chief Vijaya Gadde after finalizing the $44 billion buyout Thursday, according to Reuters.

The Tesla CEO terminated the executives “for cause,” meaning they violated company policy and voided the $20 million to $60 million each was set to receive if let go, according to The New York Times.


----------



## spr1975wshs

I was once terminated from a hourly job I had in Nebraska. When the Department of Labor made an investigation after I filed for unemployment, they determined I was fired for No Cause. I received full benefit payment, plus my former employer had to pay me the difference between that and my average paycheck with them.


----------



## Kyle




----------



## GURPS




----------



## GURPS

Musk trolls AOC after Twitter spat over subscription fees​
"Lmao at a billionaire earnestly trying to sell people on the idea that 'free speech' is actually a $8/mo subscription plan," Ocasio-Cortez wrote on the platform, in reference to owner Elon Musk's purported revenue overhaul. Musk has heavily emphasized that he seeks to curtail the platform's extant censorship practices and permit the presence of diverging viewpoints on Twitter.

"Why aren't [The New York Times, Washington Post, The Atlantic] free? Their billionaire owners should stop being greedy and give us those products for free," retorted Sacks, per The Hill. Those outlets place many articles behind a paywall and require regular subscription fees to access most of their content.

Ocasio-Cortez took exception to the comparison, asserting that a public platform with minimal moderation was not a comparable entity to the legacy media. 

"Are you seriously equating an app where people are torrenting racial slurs at an accelerated clip with the New York Times," she replied. "Also fyi, legacy newspapers actually care about verifying newsworthy sources. And they don't charge their journalists/creators for 'priority' placement."


----------



## GURPS

Musk to AOC: ‘Your feedback is appreciated, now pay $8’ ​Summary by Ground News

Elon Musk has been on something of a Twitter tear of late. He's duked it out verbally with author Stephen King over a proposed plan to charge users $8 a month for blue verification check marks. On Wednesday, he issued a terse response to New York Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez


----------



## GURPS

Bad Sign: The People Musk Just Consulted About Fighting 'Hate' Aren't Exactly Free Speech Advocates​



Almost every one of the “leaders” with which Musk spoke was among the nation’s most prominent Leftists, and there was nary a critic of Big Tech censorship among them. Will the freedom of speech really return to Twitter? Maybe. But if the people Musk consulted about combating “hate & harassment” and enforcing “election integrity” are any indication, the dreary, one-sided, fascist platform will continue pretty much as it did before.






First on Musk’s list were Jonathan Greenblatt and Yael Eisenstadt of the Anti-Defamation League (ADL). In a December 2021 PJM article, Rabbi Michael Barclay details how Greenblatt transformed the ADL “from an organization devoted to freedom and safety into a political axe for the left.” With Greenblatt at the helm, Barclay notes, “the ADL has now partnered with CAIR in fighting against anti-BDS legislation, fought for abortion, and has entirely transformed from its original purpose into an organization that is even labeled by the respected and tolerant Jewish magazine _Tablet_ as ‘mind-bendingly insane.’”

Musk also spoke with Rashad Robinson, the president of Color of Change (COC), which was created, according to Discover The Networks, in order to fight “the systemic racism pervading America generally and conservatism in particular.” Discover The Networks notes that Robinson “is also affiliated with the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation and the Right to Vote Campaign,” which is “a national collaboration of eight civil-rights organizations—including the ACLU, the NAACP, and People for the American Way—that seek to combat ‘voter disenfranchisement’ by lobbying for laws that would permit convicted felons, who are disproportionately African Americans, to vote in political elections.”


----------



## stgislander

GURPS said:


> "Also fyi, legacy newspapers actually care about verifying newsworthy sources...."




Stop!  I can't breath!


----------



## GURPS




----------



## Kyle




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## GURPS




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## GURPS

“So, here’s my question: If you’re trying to create equality on Twitter, why charge anyone to be verified? Just give everyone a blue checkmark then,” he said.

Noah admitted that he understands that Musk wants to make money, so at least he has some grasp of the capitalism involved in running a company like Twitter. But the comedian also revealed that he, like far too many on the left, doesn’t understand the free speech concerns that conservatives have.

“I think this $8 a month thing is ridiculous,” he ranted. “If you ask me, if Elon Musk wants to make money from Twitter, what he should do [is], don’t charge people for blue checkmarks. Charge white people to say the N-word. Twitter will be the most profitable company in history. Racists will be taking out loans.”

And there you go! It didn’t take long for Noah to take the conversation about free speech where the left always takes it: to the craziest extreme. To the left, when conservatives talk about free speech, it naturally means that we want racists to be able to spew their hatred anywhere and everywhere.










						The Left Is COMPLETELY CLUELESS About Conservatives' Free Speech Concerns
					

Elon Musk’s purchase of Twitter has stirred up much discussion on both sides of the political aisle. Conservatives have celebrated the idea of neutralizing censorious leftists who want to shut d...




					pjmedia.com


----------



## GURPS

This morning, radio talk show host Jesse Kelly tweeted about the upcoming elections.





This is an opinion. You don’t have to like it,  but opinions can’t, by definition, be misleading. They can be ill-informed; they can be nonsensical, but they can’t be misleading. Making it impossible to reply to, share, or like a tweet containing an opinion is not the way a free society handles ideas. We went through this with the opinions about the Russia Hoax that Robert Mueller perpetrated on the country. We went through this during the COVID “pandemic” on the likelihood of the virus originating in a lab leak and the efficacy of the Covid vaccine, mask wear, and lockdowns. I might add that Twitter was on the wrong side of the truth on all these issues.

For the record, I think the overwhelming body of evidence indicates this is precisely the case. There is no excuse for any state election apparatus to fail to produce a winner on election night (night being defined as the dawn on Wednesday). I’ve served as a chief judge at a precinct in Maryland for nearly 20 years, so I have a bit of experience in this matter.












						When Twitter Blacklists a Common Opinion as 'Misleading,' It Shows That Fascism Is Still Alive and Well in San Francisco
					

If you thought Twitter had changed its rules about what you could discuss, you were wrong.




					redstate.com


----------



## GURPS




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## PJay




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## GURPS




----------



## Sneakers

GURPS said:


>



Eh, it's a gig economy.  Learn to code.


----------



## GURPS

‘Extremely Messed Up’: Elon Musk Blasts ‘Activist Groups’ For Pushing Advertisers To Ditch Twitter, Destroy ‘Free Speech In America’​



“Twitter has had a massive drop in revenue, due to activist groups pressuring advertisers, even though nothing has changed with content moderation and we did everything we could to appease the activists,” Musk remarked on the platform. “Extremely messed up! They’re trying to destroy free speech in America.”

Indeed, a number of leftist-aligned organizations, including Media Matters for America, the NAACP, the National Center for Transgender Equality, and the Union of Concerned Scientists, recently wrote a letter to the executives of major advertisers, calling on them to “cease all advertising” if Musk backs down from content moderation.

“Not only are extremists celebrating Musk’s takeover of Twitter, they are seeing it as a new opportunity to post the most abusive, harassing, and racist language and imagery,” the organizations alleged. “This includes clear threats of violence against people with whom they disagree. Without deliberate efforts by Twitter to address this type of abuse and hate, your brands will be actively supporting accelerating extremism.”


----------



## GURPS

Elon Musk Acknowledges Left-Wing Censorship Machine Has It Out For Conservatives​

The world’s richest man has been making adjustments to the social media platform and has repeatedly solicited advice from prominent users. Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton noted to the multi-billionaire that the left has government agencies, the legacy media, and nongovernmental organizations “focused like a laser” on pressuring Big Tech companies to suppress and censor online speech, while conservatives only “have a few social media accounts and a handful of groups” fighting for free expression.

Musk replied to the social media post by admitting, “That assessment is more accurate than most people realize.”

Judicial Watch’s YouTube channel was suspended for a week after they posted a video about alleged threats to national security posed by President Joe Biden. YouTube, which is owned by Google, claimed that Judicial Watch was spreading “election misinformation.”


----------



## Kyle




----------



## GURPS

Twitter employees around the world received blunt termination notices that differed on details, leaving workers 'in limbo'​



That differing communication has triggered another wave of confusion, according to numerous messages between former employees seen by Insider.

"Again, we're in limbo," a person affected by the layoffs said.

People working in Europe, India, Singapore, New York, and California, for example, all received notes about being laid off that appeared to be written to comply with each region's labor laws.

People in New York are expected to be offered three months of severance, according to notes sent to people there, while people in California will receive two months of severance. According to state laws, covered under Worker Adjustment and Relocation Notification regulations, workers in California are required to be given 60 days of notice of a mass layoff or equal severance. In New York, it's 90 days.

Meanwhile in Europe, which has more stringent labor laws that often require employers to negotiate with employees being laid off, Twitter workers received boilerplate emails that said, "Your role at Twitter has been identified as potentially impacted or at risk of redundancy." What, if any, severance these employees would be paid was still being worked out, the emails added.


----------



## GURPS

_Hello,

As shared earlier today, Twitter is conducting a workforce reduction to help improve the health of the company. These decisions are never easy and it is with regret that we write to inform you that your role at Twitter has been impacted.

*Today is your last working day at the company, however, you will remain employed by Twitter and will receive compensation and benefits through your separation date of February 2, 2023.*

During this time, you will be on a Non-Working Notice period and your access to Twitter systems will be deactivated. While you are not expected to work during the Non-Working Notice period, you are still required to comply with all company policies, including the Employee Playbook and Code of Conduct.

Within a week, you will receive details of your severance offer, financial resources extending beyond your Non-Working Notice period. At that time you will also receive a Separation Agreement and Release of Claims and other offboarding information, such as how to return your Twitter materials (computer, badge, etc.).

Attached is an FAQ which aims to address a number of questions you may have. If your questions are not answered in the FAQ, you can reach out via [redacted]@twitter.com.

We remain grateful for all that you have done for Twitter throughout your tenure and wish you only the best in your next chapter.

Thank you.

Twitter_







So much for the California lawsuit about no 60 day notice


----------



## GURPS

Twitter advertiser boycott organized by dark money Soros, Clinton, and foreign networks​


https://twitter.com/JGo4Justice/status/1588274907544068096


Accountable Tech is financed by The North Fund, a D.C. nonprofit that is controlled by Arabella Advisors. Yes, there are multiple levels of confusion and separation, and this is on purpose. But the relevant outfit here is Arabella Advisors.

“Arabella” is a for-profit “philanthropic consulting company” founded by Clinton confidant Eric Kessler. Therefore, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that Jesse Lehrich, another Clinton network operative, is a co-founder of Accountable Tech. The organization also employs former Clinton campaign operative Zach Praiss as its digital director.







Arabella is considered the leading “dark money” political outfit in the United States. Yes, it’s much bigger and much more influential than the highly publicized “Koch Network.”

The Arabella network shields the sources of its funding by funneling its cash and political expenditures through  501c4 non profits. However, its for-profit outfit brought in $1.7 billion in 2020, and spent $1.2 billion on the 2020 election cycle.

Through its subsidiaries, Arabella has dumped hundreds of millions of dollars into projects such as fighting the Kavanaugh nomination and impeaching President Donald Trump. They’ve also financed the “NeverTrump” political advocacy of progressive war activist Bill Kristol.


----------



## GURPS




----------



## Sneakers

I'm curious how he decided who would be let go.  He doesn't personally know 99% of the staff around the world.  The people he might depend on to provide insight within Twitter might be biased, and might be ones to be terminated anyway, making their 'help' kinda worthless.

Deep dive into their online actions while employed? If they truly moderated or just cancelled opinion?


----------



## RoseRed




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## Kyle




----------



## GURPS

Musk Warns Of ‘Thermonuclear’ War Against Companies Caving To Far-Left Boycott Demands​




A number of leftist-aligned organizations, including Media Matters for America, the NAACP, the National Center for Transgender Equality, and the Union of Concerned Scientists, recently wrote a letter to the executives of major advertisers, calling on them to “cease all advertising” if Musk backs down from content moderation.

“Not only are extremists celebrating Musk’s takeover of Twitter, they are seeing it as a new opportunity to post the most abusive, harassing, and racist language and imagery,” the organizations alleged. “This includes clear threats of violence against people with whom they disagree. Without deliberate efforts by Twitter to address this type of abuse and hate, your brands will be actively supporting accelerating extremism.”

A number of large corporations, including Pfizer, Volkswagen, Mondelez International, and General Mills have temporarily paused their Twitter advertising, according to a report from The Wall Street Journal, while legacy car manufacturers GM and Ford were among the first companies to freeze advertisements on the platform, according to another report from Forbes. Both firms are entering the electric vehicle space against two-decade-old market leader Tesla, which is presently the world’s most valuable car brand. The former companies have received a number of special favors from President Joe Biden, who has also snubbed Tesla.










What a dumbass .... Alaska   is PART OF AMERICA


----------



## GURPS




----------



## stgislander

GURPS said:


>


----------



## Kyle

It would be a shame if their Teslas started running off of roads, hitting trees at 85mph.    

WWHD?


----------



## GURPS

Musk: ‘Twitter Will Not Censor Accurate Information About Anything’​
On Saturday, new Twitter head Elon Musk announced changes to Twitter’s censorship rules, insisting that “Twitter will not censor accurate information about anything.” The response came in question to a query about Twitter’s election censorship policies from Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton.

The declaration follows a promise he made last month that he will “look into” one-sided censorship during the 2022 midterm election season.


----------



## Kyle

I dont' want them to Censor anything. 

Leave the Democrats Lunatic rants on Twitter for all to read and share. 

AOC is their best Poster Child.


----------



## RoseRed




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## GURPS




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## GURPS




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## stgislander

GURPS said:


>



I like Spoon's point about if Twitter is such an "a$$" platform, like everyone seems to be saying, then why are they even on it, let alone b!tching about paying $8 to be verified.


----------



## GURPS

stgislander said:


> I like Spoon's point about if Twitter is such an "a$$" platform, like everyone seems to be saying, then why are they even on it, let alone b!tching about paying $8 to be verified.




because the loved the platform before Elon took over .. now for $ 8 any rube can be verified ... there unique status is for sale to anyone,.


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## RoseRed




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## Kyle




----------



## spr1975wshs

RoseRed said:


>



That Might matter to me if I had a clue who this dude is, and why he matters to anyone save his parents.


----------



## Ken King

spr1975wshs said:


> That Might matter to me if I had a clue *who this dude is*, and why he matters to anyone save his parents.


That's Elon, but looking at him makes me wonder if John Candy was his Dad.  Or are you talking about Ryan, him no clue also.


----------



## spr1975wshs

Ken King said:


> Or are you talking about Ryan, him no clue also


Elon, know who he is. The other


----------



## RoseRed

spr1975wshs said:


> That Might matter to me if I had a clue who this dude is, and why he matters to anyone save his parents.





Ken King said:


> That's Elon, but looking at him makes me wonder if John Candy was his Dad.  Or are you talking about Ryan, him no clue also.


I just thought it was funny.


----------



## Kyle

Elon Musk warns Twitter employees of ‘difficult times ahead,' ends remote work: report




Hours after Twitter CEO Elon Musk admittedly predicted he will do "lots of dumb things" as he learns to helm the new social media platform, he told his employees to brace for "difficult times ahead," according to a report.

In a mass email Wednesday afternoon, Musk said there was "no way to sugarcoat the message" and that employees should expect changes concerning office policy, according to Bloomberg News.  

The email allegedly said Musk will discontinue remote work and will be requiring employees to be in the office for at least 40 hours per week. Any exceptions would need his personal approval.

Musk reportedly said he expected half of Twitter’s revenue to come through a subscription service and his newly proposed verification fee. He also said content creators will be able to monetize their pages to supporters, without further elaboration.











						Elon Musk warns Twitter employees of ‘difficult times ahead,' ends remote work: report
					

Twitter owner Elon Musk informed employees of new changes he would be bringing to the office, including the discontinuation of remote work and a required 40-hour work week.




					www.foxbusiness.com


----------



## GURPS

Biden floats national security review of Musk's Twitter purchase as UN, EU demand censorship​









The new owner should stand up for free expression "to the full extent possible under relevant laws" and transparently share "government requests — or pressures — that infringe those rights," Turk told Musk. But Twitter must not "amplify" the "viral spread of harmful information," such as that related to COVID-19 vaccines, that "results in real world harms."

It must not let up on removing "hatred" from the platform, and its content moderation capacity must be sufficient to cover "all the languages and contexts in which it does business," Turk said.

His feelings appear to be reflected in the UN General Assembly, which applauded sweeping calls for internationally coordinated censorship by New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, "the smiling face of the new generation of censors" in Turley's words.

Ardern compared purported disinformation to the threats posed by the "old weapons" of war. "We came together as communities to minimize these threats," she said. "We created international rules, norms and expectations. We never saw that as a threat to our individual liberties — rather, it was a preservation of them. The same must apply now as we take on these new challenges."

As soon as Musk declared the deal closed, a European Union official implied it could block the platform across the continent if Musk didn't submit to its narrow conception of free speech in the Digital Services Act.

"In Europe, the bird will fly by our [EU] rules," Internal Market Commissioner Thierry Breton tweeted, reminding Musk of the acquiescent video he made with the bureaucrat after starting the acquisition process.

London Mayor Sadiq Khan said Twitter must engage in "direct consultation with experts in countering digital hate & misinformation" before reinstating suspended users such as former President Trump.


----------



## GURPS

Twitter’s content moderation head quits as departures alarm the FTC​​
The departures prompted a rare warning from the Federal Trade Commission, which has emerged as the government’s top Silicon Valley watchdog. It marked the second time in two days that a federal official has expressed concern about the chaotic developments at the company, coming less than 24 hours after President Biden said Musk’s relationships with other countries deserved scrutiny.

The agency said that it was “tracking the developments at Twitter with deep concern” and that it was prepared to take action to ensure the company was complying with a settlement known as a consent order, which requires Twitter to comply with certain privacy and security requirements because of allegations of past data misuse.

Twitter was first put under a consent order in 2011, and it agreed to a new order earlier this year. If the FTC finds Twitter is not complying with that order, it could fine the company hundreds of millions of dollars, potentially damaging the company’s already precarious financial state.

“No CEO or company is above the law, and companies must follow our consent decrees,” said Douglas Farrar, the FTC’s director of public affairs. “Our revised consent order gives us new tools to ensure compliance, and we are prepared to use them.”


----------



## stgislander

Elon will find somebody asap to play gatekeeper.


----------



## GURPS

Musk’s lawyer scrambles to calm Twitter staffers who fear jail over FTC scrutiny​

In a memo to staffers, attorney Alex Spiro sought to downplay concerns that Twitter’s remaining employees could be held personally liable if the company was found to have violated the Federal Trade Commission’s regulations.

Twitter is bound by a 2011 consent decree requiring regular updates affirming security protections for new features – a process made more fraught by the rapid pace of Musk’s overhaul of the social media site.

“I understand that there have been employees at Twitter who do not even work on the FTC matter commenting that they could go to jail if we were not in compliance — that is simply not how this works,” wrote Spiro, an attorney at Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan LLP.

“It is the company’s obligation. It is the company’s burden. It is the company’s liability,” Spiro added in the memo, which was first reported by Insider.

The Post has reached out to Twitter for comment.


----------



## GURPS

Someone Paid $8 For Twitter Blue And Erased $5 Billion In Market Cap From A Big Defense Company​

“Basically, tricking people is not OK,” Musk tweeted, as some users began reporting that the option to pay $7.99 for a Twitter Blue subscription had disappeared, while others who had been verified previously found that their “Official” blue checkmarks had been reinstated.

On Thursday night, a fake Lockheed Martin account with the handle @LockheedMartini and a Twitter Blue checkmark tweeted the aerospace and weapons maker will stop sales to Saudi Arabia, Israel and the U.S. “until further investigation into their record of human rights abuses.”







So someone paid $8 for Twitter blue and erased $5 billion in market cap from a big defense company!

In another example someone paid $8 for Twitter blue and wiped out $15 billion in market cap from a big pharmaceutical company
The pharmaceutical company Eli Lilly saw a 4.5 percent drop in its stock after a single tweet.

“We are excited to announce insulin is free now,” read the post from a fake Eli Lilly account that had purchased a blue verification check mark using Musk’s new Twitter Blue subscription option. The account has since lost its blue check mark and gone private.


----------



## GURPS

Dem Sen. Who Demanded Answers From Elon About 'Impersonation' Colluded With 'Impersonator'​


While Markey wanted to blame the impersonation on Musk, it was done by the reporter with the permission of Markey, as the reporter acknowledged, noting he first impersonated a comedian’s account and “Then I did my test again with the permission of a U.S. senator, Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.).”

*Then Markey used it to blow a gasket and demand answers in a formal letter to Musk, even though he, Markey, had greenlit the effort.*






But that wasn’t all. Markey didn’t just make those demands in that letter to Musk. Markey also warned Musk very specifically that if he didn’t “fix” his companies, Congress would fix them for him.






“One of your companies is under an FTC consent decree,” Markey ranted. “Auto safety watchdog NHTSA is investigating another for killing people. And you’re spending your time picking fights online. Fix your companies. Or Congress will.”

*Did a sitting senator just threaten someone for trolling him, to go after him for speech or political position? It sure sounds like that. Who is the fascist again? Hint: It’s not the Republicans, it never was. Politicians serve us, they do not rule over us and get to threaten us for questioning them. This is neither normal nor proper.*

One Twitter user also noted that Markey’s tweet was misleading.


----------



## GURPS

Oh, the Humanity! Elon Triggers the Left With His Most Evil Twitter Move Yet​


One of the things that he seems intent on doing is making the company a more viable and efficient workplace. I wrote last month about how it was more like a spa at the headquarters than a work environment, where people could work remotely if they chose to but if they came in they had meditation rooms, yoga areas, free food, and red wine on tap.




[clip]

How evil was Musk? No more free lunch at the company. Literally. He was going to make people…gasp…pay for their lunches — like most of the rest of the country.







This was how some on the left took it: that Musk was evil “incarnate” who was now “starving” employees. It was such a window into how the left thinks.








https://twitter.com/Ravi76252778/status/1592014115337547776


----------



## GURPS




----------



## GURPS




----------



## GURPS




----------



## GURPS

Elon Musk schools fired Twitter employee on why free lunches he nixed cost over $400 per meal​

Musk took to Twitter on Sunday in response to The New York Times reporting that Twitter employees would have to start paying for their own lunches, just like everyone else does.

He pointed out that criticism of the cut was “especially bizarre given that almost no one came into the office.”


----------



## GURPS

Elon Musk rehires Ligma and Johnson, says, 'firing them was truly...'​











It must be noted that Ligma and Johnson are the same pair that were photographed leaving the San Francisco, Office of Twitter carrying one box each of their belongings.

At the time, the duo tricked multiple media outlets as the public anxiously awaited news on whether Tesla CEO had begun axing staffers.

Musk was quick to react to the whole prankster episode by tweeting that "Ligma Johnson had it coming."

Then, Musk reacted again to the whole prank and wrote, "One of the best trolls ever", with two laughing emojis.


----------



## GURPS

Elon Musk says he's getting rid of 'Twitter for iPhone' labels, which people used to catch Android brands and ambassadors tweeting from Apple devices​

Elon Musk, the new billionaire owner of Twitter, said on Monday that Twitter would get rid of the label on tweets specifying what kind of device they were sent from, such as an iPhone.

"And we will finally stop adding what device a tweet was written on (waste of screen space & compute) below every tweet," Musk tweeted. "Literally no one even knows why we did that …"

As Chance Miller, editor-in-chief of the Apple news website 9to5mac.com, noted on Twitter, the company got rid of the feature in 2012 but re-implemented it in 2018.

Twitter says that these source labels "help you better understand how a Tweet was posted."


----------



## GURPS

Elon Musk says free employee lunches at Twitter HQ were costing more than $400 per meal because 'almost no one' was in the office​

He said that according to badge-in records, average occupancy in the office over the last 12 months was below 10%, peaking at 25%.

Musk was tweeting Sunday after The New York Times reported that Twitter employees would have to start paying for office lunches themselves.

He said criticism of the move was "especially bizarre given that almost no one came into the office," adding: "There are more people preparing breakfast than eating breakfast. They don't even bother serving dinner, because there is no one in the building."

Twitter spends $13 million a year on food service at its San Francisco HQ, Musk said.

Musk was challenged on his $400 meal cost estimate by Tracy Hawkins, a former Twitter employee. Hawkins' LinkedIn profile says she was a VP for real estate and work transformation at Twitter, with a focus on hybrid working.


----------



## Kyle




----------



## GURPS

Musk fires Twitter engineers for correcting, criticizing him on Twitter, Slack​

As the number of Twitter staff fired for tweets grows to at least four, Big Tech reporter Gergely Orosz tweeted that the remaining staff must also watch what they say in Slack. Before Musk’s takeover, the culture at Twitter encouraged staff to be critical in the company Slack, Bloomberg reported. Any employee who thought they were still free to do that now seemingly risks learning the hard way that being critical about Twitter is no longer an option under Musk's leadership.

“Another ~10 Twitter employees who made sassy or critical remarks about Twitter's current leadership on a Twitter internal Slack channel have been terminated overnight,” Orosz tweeted. “One person was told they are let go ‘for recent behavior.’”

At Twitter, a line seems to have been drawn between Twitter staff and Musk’s advisers and engineers brought in from Tesla and the Boring Company, The Verge reported, and while some of this discord is spilling out onto Twitter publicly, more is leaking out via shared screenshots of the company’s Slack. Things that probably irk Musk include Twitter staff referring to Musk’s trusted outsiders as “the goons” on Slack. One Twitter employee posted on Slack, vaguely summarizing how Musk had shattered team morale: “I’m wondering when people will realize the value of Twitter was the people that worked here.”

Musk has said that he will grant access to code to engineers who need to make urgent changes on a case-by-case basis. But rather than talk to engineers about changes Musk might consider urgent, Musk appears to be fielding some of his questions about Twitter functionality from random Twitter users.

Publicly demonstrating his distrust for Twitter engineers, firing those who criticize him, and freezing out people most knowledgeable of Twitter’s products and services, Orosz tweeted, gives Twitter engineers little reason to stick around and rally around Musk.





_Maybe Musk doesn't trust Twitter Engineers for the way the company played with the code to shadow ban people they disagreed with. Since the twitter mob is very unhappy that Musk will restore accounts of users they disagree with and want banned from the public square_


----------



## Kyle

Compromise.

Make each of the Twitter Minions wear an explosive collar like in Running man. 

If they do their job, alls well. If they get out of line...


----------



## GURPS

Guardrails that have to be built around social media? Just exactly what kind of “guardrails” is he talking about and who gets to decide what those are? Government deciding what speech is “permissible”? That sounds suspiciously like the government not only going after a private company they don’t like but also placing restrictions on speech. Markey even threatens Musk will “pay a price,” if Elon doesn’t bend to what he wants. Who are the fascists here? It’s not the Republicans.

As journalist Glenn Greenwald observes, the tech companies are not randomly trying to censor people, it’s because they’re being pushed by people like Markey. The impersonation that Markey himself okayed is just the latest hook to support their agenda.






















						Senator Ed Markey Ramps up the Threats Against Elon Musk
					

Democrats know they're losing control...




					redstate.com


----------



## Kyle




----------



## Bare-ya-cuda

Give the democrats enough time and they will destroy twitter and even the internet just like everything else they touch.


----------



## GURPS

Twitter in Chaos After Elon Musk Ultimatum, HQ Building Shut Down​







Keep in mind that Alex Heath is a liberal hack who wants Musk to fail. He’s already been running a subversion campaign against the company since the transfer of ownership, quoting anonymous sources to paint a bleak picture of Twitter’s future.

Is that reality, though? I’m skeptical. Musk didn’t get to where he is by being stupid, and he’s so far managed to increase Twitter’s usage since taking over despite claims the site’s traffic would drop off. Employees on their way out the door are also not the best barometer of the situation given they have every incentive to overstate their importance. I’d bet Musk has a team of engineers ready to assist if Twitter’s team dwindles too far.

Besides, at the end of the day, Twitter is a social media site. It’s not a rocket being sent to the moon. The infrastructure is already in place, and the actual manpower needed to keep it running is far less than what the company’s workforce consisted of prior to Musk’s takeover. He’s going to eventually, even if by some trial and error, figure out what is necessary and what isn’t, and I’d suggest you could keep the site running with just a few hundred people if it came down to that.






The move to shut down the building is being spun as tyrannical, but it makes sense to me. There are a lot of angry, leftwing ex-employees who would love nothing more than to see Musk get knocked down a notch. The last thing he can afford is for someone to sabotage the company. Apparently, now that the deadline for employees to choose to stay has passed, access will be whittled down to only those who should be there.


----------



## GURPS




----------



## Kyle

‘Twitter Is Dead,’ 300 Million People Post On Twitter



WORLD — Hundreds of millions of people around the world mourned the sudden death of Twitter last night with hundreds of millions of heartfelt posts on Twitter.

"Twitter is dead. This is it. Goodbye, cruel world!" wrote Washington Post journalist Geebles Snortleton as it became clear the social media site had only a few hours of life left. "It's been great! I'll miss you all! Find me on Meta! It's the wave of the future!"

The post has thus far received 12 likes and 3,487 retweets.












						‘Twitter Is Dead,’ 300 Million People Post On Twitter
					

WORLD — Hundreds of millions of people around the world mourned the sudden death of Twitter last night with hundreds of millions of heartfelt posts on Twitter.




					babylonbee.com


----------



## GURPS




----------



## RoseRed




----------



## GURPS

Twitter explodes as Musk's poll tops 12 million, favoring Trump's return​


----------



## GURPS

CBS News Suspends Twitter Posting​

The network claims it stopped using its account to “monitor” the situation at Twitter after Elon Musk’s takeover.

“In light of the uncertainty around Twitter and out of an abundance of caution, CBS News is pausing its activity on the social media site as it continues to monitor the platform,” Jonathan Vigliotti, CBS News national correspondent, said according to a report from NBC News Saturday.

[clip]

In a recent “open letter,” leftist advocacy group Accountable Tech and other progressive groups demanded that corporations pull their ads from Twitter.

“Elon Musk's takeover of Twitter came with his promise to advertisers like you that the social network would not transform into a ‘free-for-all hellscape’ and would remain ‘warm and welcoming to all,’” the letter read.

Accountable Tech’s website claims the group “is working to bring about long-term structural reform to tackle the existential threat social media companies pose to our information ecosystem and democracy.”


----------



## GURPS




----------



## GURPS

The Establishment Scrambles To Crush Its Agenda’s Worst Nightmare​





But Markey evidently seems out of the loop on how censorious Twitter really was before Musk’s takeover. For instance, he says that the problem with Musk making a blue check available to anyone who pays $8 a month for it, is that “Joe Blow” can say “don’t wear a mask, don’t worry about Covid” while pretending to be the CDC or some more reputable agency while doing it.

“Joe Blow can say whatever Joe Blow wants to say within certain boundaries,” Markey said. 

But can he?

Up until a day ago, Twitter had banned the popular satire site the Babylon Bee for making fun of a Biden Administration official, Rachel Levine, who serves as the Assistant Secretary for Health for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). Clinical psychologist Dr. Jordan B. Peterson was banned for criticizing transgender surgeries and tweeting “remember when pride was a sin?”


----------



## GURPS




----------



## HemiHauler

Looks like Elon Musk isn’t the free speech absolutist y’all were looking for.


----------



## GURPS




----------



## PJay




----------



## PJay

Elon Musk tweets that addressing the child sexual exploitation content on Twitter is priority #1!





















						Elon Musk Is Addressing Issue of Child Sexual Exploitation Content on Twitter After Years of Inactivity Under Platform’s Past Management
					

Elon Musk has begun addressing the issue of posting child sexual exploitation content on Twitter after years of inactivity on the platform under past management. Previously, the platform did not comprehensively address the issue of publishing content that demonstrates the sexual exploitation of...




					www.tesmanian.com


----------



## GURPS




----------



## PJay

Project Veritas REINSTATED to Twitter









						BREAKING: Project Veritas REINSTATED to Twitter
					

Project Veritas was suspended in 2021 after they released a video showing Facebook Vice President Guy Rosen admitting that the social media platform “freezes” comment sections on posts where they suspect, but have not necessarily have confirmed, that “hate speech” is taking place.




					thepostmillennial.com


----------



## Sneakers

Kinda like Tron when the towers start lighting up.  'Cept they turned blue from red.


----------



## stgislander

Sneakers said:


> Kinda like Tron when the towers start lighting up.  'Cept they turned blue from red.


 Nice reference.


----------



## PJay

​‘Musk Is A Cuck’: Bannon & Citizen Free Press Throw Down On Shady Chinese Financing Of Twitter Deal​


----------



## GURPS

‘Priority #1’: Elon Musk To Address Twitter’s Child Sexual Exploitation Problem​
Twitter’s alleged child pornography problem has been an issue for over a decade. Advocates for removing the material have been pleading with previous management to create immediate solutions for the sake of children who have been exploited for profit from material showing graphic pedophilia acts from their abusers.

Twitter spokeswoman Katie Rosborough told The Verge last summer that the platform has “zero tolerance for child sexual exploitation.”

“We aggressively fight online child sexual abuse and have invested significantly in technology and tools to enforce our policy,” Rosborough said. “Our dedicated teams work to stay ahead of bad-faith actors and to help ensure we’re protecting minors from harm — both on and offline.”


----------



## GURPS

Elon Musk's Twitter tyranny​


Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla, new owner of Twitter and self-declared free speech absolutist, is reportedly scurrying around the internet and his Slack channels firing and silencing workers who disagree with him.

The hypocrisy shouldn’t be surprising. Americans often celebrate business leaders and entrepreneurs as icons of liberty and the expansive national spirit of free enterprise. The truth, though, is that business leaders are bosses, and a lot of the average worker’s typical subjugation occurs on the job. Musk’s treatment of his employees is a reminder that even bosses who claim to embrace freedom often, in practice, do not.

Musk took over Twitter less than a month ago, and immediately started making changes. Saddled with enormous debt from his inflated purchase price, Musk’s first cost-cutting measure was to fire half of Twitter’s workforce, including vital executives. One engineering manager vomited after he learned he was going to be forced to eliminate hundreds of people.

The people who were let go might consider themselves the lucky ones at this point. Musk has spent the past few days cozying up to the sort of far-right individuals who have long railed against Twitter, against the “liberal elite” and really anyone trying to regulate or critique racism and bigotry. Indeed, Musk is now acting as if he thinks his employees are lazy subversives who need to be disciplined and crushed.









Sorry Charlie .... employees do not get to bad mouth their employer what is the statement progressives say,


_Words have consequences_


----------



## GURPS

Elon Musk Joins Anti-LGBTQ+ Libs of TikTok to Mock Fired Employee​https://finance.yahoo.com/news/elon-musk-joins-anti-lgbtq-222550935.html#


The wealthiest man in the world, who had proclaimed himself a free speech absolutist before banning comedian Kathy Griffin from Twitter for mocking him, and who, in the two weeks of owning the social media platform, has overseen a mass exodus of employees (both firings and resignations), a radical increase in hate speech, and advertisers pulling contracts left and right, spent time making ableist jokes to a right-wing hate account on his $44 billion app.

On Tuesday afternoon, the anti-LGBTQ+ hate account Libs of TikTok tweeted several screenshots of a Twitter employee’s tweets that had resulted in their firing.

“How it started...How it’s going,” the account tweeted above the screenshots at 1:05 p.m. Eastern.

Thirteen minutes later, at 1:18 p.m., Elon Musk, who was not tagged in the tweet, replied to Libs of TikTok.

“A tragic case of adult onset Tourette’s,” Musk wrote.













Libs of TikTok, run by Chaya Raichik, has spent months maligning transgender Americans and the LGBTQ+ community more broadly. The account, according to experts, engages in stochastic terrorism tactics constantly. Yet Republicans and right-wing media personalities have embraced and amplified the account in the run-up to the midterm election.




Stochastic Terrorism . by merely repeating what queers post on TikTok


----------



## GURPS

The true tragedy behind Musk’s Twitter buyout is the power of billionaires​

Musk’s takeover of Twitter will affect millions of people both here at home and around the globe. The platform has no fewer than 450 million monthly active users and is one of the world’s most popular communication mediums. Other expected changes that Musk could make to Twitter — most notably, lifting the account suspensions of former President Trump and other high-profile, right-wing figures — will have huge ramifications in the age of misinformation. 

[clip]

Billionaires certainly use their wealth to purchase private power in these ways but, critically, they also use it to purchase_ public_ power. Since the 2010 Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission Supreme Court decision, billionaires have come to dominate the campaign finance scene in America to an astounding degree. They spent a whopping $881 million in this year’s midterm elections — 44 percent more than they did in the last midterm cycle in 2018. In the 2020 elections, billionaires contributed almost 1 out of every 10 dollars received by federal campaigns, with the top 20 combined spending over $2.3 billion, or more than twice as much as the entire Biden campaign. 

Their political investments have certainly paid off, as public policy outcomes have come to almost exclusively reflect the interests and preferences of wealthy Americans. We can see this in many different policy areas, but nowhere more so than in the tax code. Today, billionaires pay much lower effective tax rates than everyday Americans who work for a living. Between 2014 and 2018, the richest 25 billionaires paid an average effective tax rate of just 3.4 percent on over $400 billion in gains while the average American pays 13.3 percent. *And if that wasn’t enough, billionaires can, incredibly, sometimes get away with paying nothing at all in taxes, like Elon Musk did in 2018. *

Unchecked billionaire wealth and power is a veritable crisis facing America today. It is unhealthy to live in a society where a few billionaires like Musk dictate how we go about living virtually every aspect of our day-to-day lives. Change needs to happen, and it needs to happen fast. 

*As of now, the best path forward to solving this crisis lies in taxing the rich. We certainly need to reform our campaign finance system to dilute the influence of big money, and we also need to safeguard our private institutions from being overwhelmed by billionaires’ voices and demands. At the very least, however, we need to take steps to strip billionaires of the resources — i.e. their extreme wealth — that enable their power in the first place by taxing them more. *

_Howard Klein is the former president of Reprise Records. He is a cofounder of Blue America PAC and a member of the Patriotic Millionaires._




Progressive Jealousy at its finest


----------



## Kyle

Taliban Quits Twitter To Protest Return Of Trump

KANDAHAR, AFGHANISTAN — Individuals and organizations are quitting Twitter in droves to protest Elon Musk's "recklessly violent" decision to reinstate Donald Trump's Twitter account, chief among them the Taliban.

The legitimate government's final tweet read, "So long, and thanks for all the American weapons!"

"Long has Twitter served as a safe haven of free speech for North Korea, Iran, Al Qaeda, and ourselves," said Taliban Spokesman Badrash Onmyrhir, still tired from a long day of lashing young women for daring to remove their head scarves. "But with Trump's return to the platform, we no longer feel safe from his violent and hurtful tweets."










						Taliban Quits Twitter To Protest Return Of Trump
					

KANDAHAR, AFGHANISTAN — Individuals and organizations are quitting Twitter in droves to protest Elon Musk's "recklessly violent" decision to reinstate Donald Trump's Twitter account, chief among them the Taliban.




					babylonbee.com


----------



## Sneakers

Kyle said:


> we no longer feel safe from his violent and hurtful tweets."


 

Remind me they said this when they blow up someone.


----------



## GURPS

Elon Musk Just Exposed Twitter’s Censorship Problem in One Simple Tweet​












Of course, there are plenty of other examples of the activist media pushing deceptive reports on Twitter’s platform. Every hoax, fake narrative, and lie they have told has been disseminated on the bird app. Indeed, it has been one of their primary propaganda tools over the past decade.

Under the old management, these falsehoods were never punished. Members of the activist media knew they could exploit the platform to peddle their narratives without worrying about the consequences.

On the other hand, the social media company’s censorship brigade routinely took action against conservative influencers if they expressed viewpoints the left deemed to be “misinformation.” This was especially true during the COVID-19 pandemic when they suppressed opinions that went against the Democrat-approved narrative on the virus and vaccines. The company went so far as to ban the _New York Post_ story about Hunter Biden’s laptop in 2019 to help Joe Biden win the presidency.

This isn’t to say that absolutely no left-wing accounts have been banned. But the high-profile influencers and activist media outlets received no such treatment, according to Musk.


----------



## GURPS

If owning the libs was a sport, Elon Musk would be competing for a national championship. The billionaire, who had never even voted for a Republican until recently, has been forced into an adversarial relationship with the left simply for supporting the basic principle of free speech.

Yet, despite their vitriol, Musk did attempt to offer them an olive branch shortly after completing his deal to buy Twitter. Early on, much to the chagrin of conservatives, he set up a “content moderation council” that was supposed to meet and decide just how free the speech on the social media site would be. Those present on the council included the ADL and the NAACP.

Just weeks later, Musk dissolved the council, though. He then held a public poll which eventually led to Donald Trump’s account being reinstated. That sent Jonathan Greenblatt, the leftwing hack who heads the ADL, on a Twitter rampage.








The arrogance of Greenblatt asking “is it time for Twitter to go,” as if he has any say whatsoever in the matter, is just incredible. What’s more incredible is that these clownish activist groups truly believe they are immune from the consequences of their actions because, on Tuesday, Musk revealed why he booted the ADL and others to the curb.









						Elon Musk Teaches Leftwing Activists That Actions Have Consequences
					

Groups that are used to dictating are learning they no longer have the same power.




					redstate.com


----------



## GURPS




----------



## GURPS

Musk And Skeleton Crew Take On Problem Ousted Twitter Employees Ignored: Child Exploitation​


----------



## GURPS




----------



## Kyle

GURPS said:


>



Well, they were catering to Democrats, so....


----------



## stgislander

Kyle said:


> Well, they were catering to Democrats, so....


So is she saying Pizzagate was a thing?!!


----------



## Kyle

stgislander said:


> So is she saying Pizzagate was a thing?!!


There was probably some poor Samoan kid regretting there was ever such a thing as Pineapple Pizza.


----------



## Sneakers

stgislander said:


> So is she saying Pizzagate was a thing?!!


What about Peetzagate?  I think Wiki was working in cahoots with Twitter when they canceled Peetza.


----------



## GURPS

Elon Musk Might Be Gearing up to Make Leftists’ Heads Explode – Again​

Prominent leftist influencers insist that Musk’s focus on free speech will only lead to more misinformation and bigotry being promulgated on the site. But in reality, they seem to be more frightened by the prospect of people who espouse views different from theirs might just have a level playing field when it comes to expressing ideas.


----------



## GURPS




----------



## GURPS

> But one of the rallying cries from the movement, “hands up don’t shoot,” was picked apart incessantly by right-wing pundits who sought to exonerate the police officer, much like Musk is still doing today. Witnesses to the shooting claimed Brown had his hands up, though the U.S. Department of Justice investigators didn’t find this credible. Wilson, who shot Brown at least six times, claimed that Brown had charged at him and the shooting was in self-defense.
> Gizmodo isn’t going to relitigate what happened in 2014. But we do find it notable that Musk wants to reopen the wounds of that summer, either to stoke more controversy on his social media platform with the hopes that it generates attention for a site that’s hemorrhaging advertisers, or simply because Musk wants to signal to his right-wing fans that he’s well and truly one of them. Whatever his goal, Musk succeeded at proving he desperately wants approval from the absolute worst people on the planet.



How dare Musk post the truth! That fiend! The cop didn’t just claim it was in self-defense, the evidence and the investigations supported that it was. Gizmodo knows that, but they still want to pump the anger, rather than the truth.

But liberals don’t want the truth and that’s what Musk has truly been showing with his takeover of Twitter.

Musk made another comment about how much the world’s conversation had been distorted by Twitter which shows he truly gets it. This is why the left is so mad, that they could spread all the radical narrative across the world when they had control but now they can’t. And Elon vowed he’s going to stop that “thumb on the scale.”



















						Elon Blows Apart Liberal Myth on Ferguson, Makes It Even Better With Big Vow for Twitter
					

This is going to break the liberal stranglehold...




					redstate.com


----------



## glhs837

Saw a thing about the supposed hate speech that spiked 500% after Musk took over. Seems its now dropped lower than it was before he took over. He said the solution was to drop accounts with a faster typing speed than a meth addict on amphetamines.


----------



## TPD

"Any unmoderated forum will inevitably become right wing"

This makes sense - I think we can see it right here on these forums. Thx vrai for being light on the moderation and letting all views heard.


----------



## GURPS

glhs837 said:


> Saw a thing about the supposed hate speech that spiked 500% after Musk took over.




From what I have read, trolls [ probably progressives ] have been dropping the N-Word left, right and center .... with no context other than to say N-Word, in a vain attempt to high light how twitter has ' FALLEN ' with no moderation  .... since Musk took over - therefore Musk is racist / racist adjacent

' see Twitter is over run with all these racists '

Not white supremists being racist, but progressives trying to drive a fake narrative


----------



## GURPS

TPD said:


> This makes sense - I think we can see it right here on these forums. Thx vrai for being light on the moderation and letting all views heard.




leftist ideas cannot stand to scrutiny .... they do not run on FACTS, but  reactions based on emotionms...... FACTS not emotions win at the end of the day

otherwise moderated forums turn leftist as counter viewpoints are banned 

look at Reddit ... most every sub is over run with progressive group think - ANY topic where politics comes up anyone not supporting the progressive narrative is banned .. even as mundane a knitting ]  .... they banned the Trump sub as hate speech, when the simple fact is, progressives could not handle the FACTS opposing the progressive narrative


----------



## glhs837

GURPS said:


> From what I have read, trolls [ probably progressives ] have been dropping the N-Word left, right and center .... with no context other than to say N-Word, in a vain attempt to high light how twitter has ' FALLEN ' with no moderation  .... since Musk took over - therefore Musk is racist / racist adjacent
> 
> ' see Twitter is over run with all these racists '
> 
> Not white supremists being racist, but progressives trying to drive a fake narrative


So it's actually a bit more insidious than that. What musks post tells us is not that a billion liberal monkeys typing on a billion liberal typewriters produce the n-word a lot. But rather than a far smaller number, set up bot accounts to flood the system with the n-word. Hence the reference to typing speed of a meth head.


----------



## GURPS

Elon Musk Makes an Interesting Announcement About ‘Hate Speech’ on Twitter​


Remember when leftists were melting down after Elon Musk took over Twitter? Democrats and media activists were stunned and irate, insisting this would lead to rampant white supremacy on the platform.

After there was a notable uptick in the use of the n-word on the site, they cited this as proof that Musk’s focus on free speech was only going to embolden the racist dregs of society. All this despite the fact that this was occurring before the new CEO even made any changes to the algorithms or content moderation policy.

*But when it became clear that the increase was due to a few hundred accounts – most of them bots – the narrative began to fall apart, as is the case with most left-wing hoaxes.*

Now, it appears the platform has gotten this non-issue under control. On Wednesday, Musk posted a tweet with a chart showing how the reach of tweets engaging in “hate speech” has declined lower than it was even before Musk took over the company. “Hate speech impressions down by 1/3 from pre-spike levels. Congrats to Twitter team!” he tweeted.


----------



## GURPS




----------



## GURPS

Musk says suspended Twitter accounts will be granted amnesty ‘next week’​
“Should Twitter offer a general amnesty to suspended accounts, provided that they have not broken the law or engaged in egregious spam?” Musk asked in the poll.

As of Thursday afternoon, a little more than 3 million users had participated in the poll, and just under three-quarters had voted in favor of the amnesty. 

“The people have spoken. Amnesty begins next week. Vox Populi, Vox Dei,” Musk said, using the Latin phrase meaning “the voice of the people is the voice of God.”


----------



## GURPS

Elon Musk fired dozens more Twitter staff the night before Thanksgiving — days after saying he was done with layoffs​

The employees fired overnight on Wednesday were informed they were being laid off for performance reasons, and were given one month of severance, one of the people said.

The termination process was similar to that experienced by previously laid-off employees, the two people said: Access to work tools and computers were cut off, and a notice of termination was sent to affected employees' personal email accounts.

Thousands of Twitter employees have already been laid off, resigned, or fired by Musk, leaving critical workers stretched thin. Twitter teams are already so short-handed that many employees have had to work on Thanksgiving, the people said.


----------



## GURPS

Musk to Release Twitter Internal Discussions on Censoring Hunter Biden Laptop Story​


----------



## GURPS




----------



## GURPS




----------



## glhs837

Irony meter has broken on this one....... 









						Eric Blair (@protecttruth@mastodon.online)
					

I’ve had a lot of people ask me recently why not stay on Twitter and fight.  The reason is because Musk controls the algorithm. He could ban you tomorrow, and he could also just deprioritize every one of your tweets so no one sees them.  You can’t fight and win when the opponent has complete...




					mastodon.online


----------



## Kyle

glhs837 said:


> Irony meter has broken on this one.......
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Eric Blair (@protecttruth@mastodon.online)
> 
> 
> I’ve had a lot of people ask me recently why not stay on Twitter and fight.  The reason is because Musk controls the algorithm. He could ban you tomorrow, and he could also just deprioritize every one of your tweets so no one sees them.  You can’t fight and win when the opponent has complete...
> 
> 
> 
> 
> mastodon.online


And completely lost on them.


----------



## PrchJrkr

Okay, I just had to go over to Mastodon to see what's up. These flakes are better off not being seen by real folks. If they're really that clueless, good riddance.


----------



## CPUSA

Didn't one of our Multi Gendered forum retards make the failed prediction that Musk wouldn't actually make the Twitter deal?
Did they ever come back on here & admit that were wrong?...About this & everything else they have ever stated on here?

Or do they just realize it goes without saying?...


----------



## SamSpade

GURPS said:


> From what I have read, trolls [ probably progressives ] have been dropping the N-Word left, right and center .... with no context other than to say N-Word, in a vain attempt to high light how twitter has ' FALLEN ' with no moderation  .... since Musk took over - therefore Musk is racist / racist adjacent
> 
> ' see Twitter is over run with all these racists '
> 
> Not white supremists being racist, but progressives trying to drive a fake narrative


Which is why using Internet reaction as a metric for the general public is so rife with error, it astounds me that anyone tries to take it seriously.

Ever been on a conservative site, and they ask a question that ANY conservative is highly likely to answer only one way - and you look at the results, and - wow - it's like 90%+ one way? Of course it is - because it's not a sample of the general public. It's a measure how readers of that site feel and nothing more.

It's very hard to get a read on these kinds of things. Even regular opinion polling is MUCH harder than just plain old statistical sampling, because while numbers generally don't LIE, people almost always do. When we sample something like how many employees a company has or what benefits they have - those numbers don't change. But a person's OPINION can change overnight.

The idea that a SUDDEN SPIKE in use of the N-word - on a site like "Twitter", not widely known to be the home turf of conservatives - is absurd. It didn't take long for someone to notice that the activity was being gamed.


----------



## SamSpade

CPUSA said:


> Didn't one of our Multi Gendered forum retards make the failed prediction that Musk wouldn't actually make the Twitter deal?
> Did they ever come back on here & admit that were wrong?...About this & everything else they have ever stated on here?
> 
> Or do they just realize it goes without saying?...


I wasn't sure he would. I thought he was probably toying with them, to drive down their stock and embarrass them.

Genius or not, he's  been very adept at seeing what the future will hold. I have little doubt that should the technology catch up, electric cars WILL be a thing, eventually. In the 80's, a select few had "car phones". By the mid 90's, people began to buy mobile phones and by the 00's, smart phones were the rage. NOW, they're so ubiquitous, a lot of things are taken for granted that if you HAVE a phone, it's a smart cell phone. That's a transition of 30 years, and the path to their popularity was the usual one for technology - the "killer app" idea - the single or several apps that make purchase absolutely necessary.

So while he may not SEEM brilliant - his business acumen, I generally trust to be keen.


----------



## Sneakers

Now you did it, Sam.  His head is going to swell up and burst all over the place.


----------



## GURPS

SamSpade said:


> The idea that a SUDDEN SPIKE in use of the N-word - on a site like "Twitter", not widely known to be the home turf of conservatives - is absurd. It didn't take long for someone to notice that the activity was being gamed.




Sam, that is what progressives think, Twitter is over run with Neo Nazi's and the KKK now that Musk has taken over and fired the moderation team


----------



## GURPS

Elon Musk knows what he's doing at Twitter, and it's making activist journalists panic​

The progressive playground for years is no more, with Musk embracing this totally-foreign concept of free speech and not subscribing to the totalitarian tactics of the old Twitter, which resulted in censorship and suppression and the banning of accounts that is the norm in places like China and North Korea. 

The most egregious example of this by a country mile, of course, was the Hunter Biden laptop bombshell via the New York Post that hit just weeks before the 2020 election. You know what happened from there: Twitter locked out any account that shared the story, including those of the Trump campaign. Huntergate was also immediately dubbed Russian disinformation, thanks to "reporters" who toed the line for the Biden campaign. 

Joe Biden himself called the report "garbage" and a "Russian plant." Fifty-one former intelligence officers also penned a letter pushing the Russia angle, all without one actually having access to the evidence. And almost everyone in the political media bought it hook, line and sinker.


----------



## GURPS

Glenn Greenwald butchers Taylor Lorenz for 'asylum-worthy babbling' about Musk's Twitter plans​


----------



## glhs837

How bad do they hate Musk? 

He responds to a tweet about Madagascars species being unique due to it being isolated for 88 million years, and the crowd says he's dog whistling for Heil Hitler...... At least a few of thier own showed some common sense


----------



## GURPS

Yesterday, Rebel news reported that Portland Antifa extremists, angry that Twitter banned their violent rhetoric, publicly vowed to sabotage Tesla manufacturing plants to teach Elon Musk a lesson.

It started early yesterday when Musk criticized Twitter’s former management for allowing violent leftwing rhetoric to continue on the platform, in spite of banning countless conservative voices for much less serious offenses:









After a bunch of users responded to the thread with more examples of Antifa’s posts calling for violence, including coordinating riots, posting instructions on how to build weapons, specifically targeting named individuals, and calling for violence against — of all people — Libs of TikTok, Twitter started banning the most egregious leftwing accounts.

Antifa didn’t like it.

Courageous independent journalist Andy Ngo reported late yesterday that Antifa was calling for attacks on Tesla.







I’ll bet you a steak dinner that the FBI will not be raiding any Antifa apartments, or even investigating this REAL domestic terrorism, in any way, despite claiming to be “focusing” on the threat of “domestic terrorism” for almost two years now.










						☕️ C&C NEWS ☙ Saturday, November 26, 2022 ☙ IN THE DARK 🦠
					

There's a lot going on with Twitter and you'll find it all here; Disney rapidly reorganizes; Died Suddenly doc spreading; San Fran hotels pay millions to de-louse; Ukraine is now powerless; and more.




					www.coffeeandcovid.com


----------



## GURPS




----------



## GURPS




----------



## GURPS




----------



## GURPS

Exclusive: Brands blast Twitter for ads next to child pornography accounts​


----------



## GURPS




----------



## GURPS

WaPo’s Taylor Lorenz Tries to ‘Parler’ Twitter After Elon Musk’s ‘Amnesty’ Vow for Suspended Accounts​

That _Washington Post_ “technology columnist/reporter” Taylor Lorenz has sociopathic tendencies has been well-documented, with her doxxing the accounts of Internet users she doesn’t like and then her complaining when her “rules” are turned around on her.

So it should be no surprise to anyone that the latest target on Lorenz’s social media hit list is none other than Twitter owner Elon Musk, who greatly triggered Lorenz and her cohorts in the MSM and on the left earlier this week with his vow to grant “amnesty” to Twitter accounts that in the past were suspended.

As a result, Lorenz wrote a lengthy piece Thursday in which so-called “experts” (aka her friends in the left-wing media and academia) said in so many words that something must be done about it before it’s too late.

Among the sources quoted were far-left Media Matters for America (MMFA) president Angelo Carusone and Harvard Law School Cyberlaw Clinic instructor Alejandra Caraballo – a militant transgender activist who in concert with MMFA got Twitter to ban the use of the word “groomers” back in July “when it is used as a descriptor, in context of discussion of gender identity.”


----------



## GURPS




----------



## Sneakers

> I certainly hope it does not come to that, but, yes, if there is no other choice, I will make an alternative phone


And it would work anywhere off of his Starlink sat system.


----------



## Kyle




----------



## PrchJrkr

Kyle said:


> View attachment 167474



That thing shouldn't have a job. It should be in a padded cell somewhere. I thought self mutilation was a treatable illness. Surely that thing has mental issues.


----------



## my-thyme

PrchJrkr said:


> That thing shouldn't have a job. It should be in a padded cell somewhere. I thought self mutilation was a treatable illness. Surely that thing has mental issues.


They closed all the mental institutions and integrated their residents/potential residents into society.


----------



## Kyle

my-thyme said:


> They closed all the mental institutions and integrated their residents/potential residents into society and the Democrat Party.


----------



## spr1975wshs

Kyle said:


> View attachment 167474


Have never quite understood why mutilating oneself is desirable.


----------



## Sneakers

spr1975wshs said:


> Have never quite understood why mutilating oneself is desirable.


Well, pretty obvious that the nose piercings are totally functional.  Keeps her glasses from sliding off her nose.


----------



## Kyle

I'm waiting for the latest piercing trend to become the Phineas Gage.


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## Kyle

Sen. Ed Markey renews feud with Elon Musk in ridiculed tweet: 'He's just not that into you'


The Massachusetts Democrat called on Congress to pass laws to 'end the era of failed Big Tech self-regulation'


Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass., renewed his now on-going feud with Twitter CEO Elon Musk for the latter’s refusal to take the senator’s demands seriously Saturday.

Markey tweeted that Musk had refused to respond to his formal letter sent out on Nov. 11 requiring answers regarding Musk’s plans to combat disinformation on Twitter. The Democrat said that Saturday marked one day after his original deadline and that Musk has yet to formally respond beyond jabs on Twitter.

He tweeted, "@elonmusk could respond to my tweets but failed to respond to my letter by yesterday’s deadline and answer basic questions about Twitter verification. Congress must end the era of failed Big Tech self-regulation and pass laws that put user safety over the whims of billionaires."

Additional social media users attacked Markey for continuing to threaten Musk.

*"He's just not that into you," author Jim Hanson joked.

PJ Media columnist Stacey Lennox tweeted, "He opposes voter ID but is super concerned about a blue check on Twitter. Insane."

Reason contributing editor J.D. Tucciille wrote, "We should all be free to ignore pissy little government officials like @SenMarkey."*












						Sen. Ed Markey renews feud with Elon Musk in ridiculed tweet: 'He's just not that into you'
					

Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass., attacked Twitter head Elon Musk on Saturday for refusing to respond to his letter demanding an explanation for the Twitter verification process.




					www.foxnews.com


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## GURPS




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## spr1975wshs

Elon posted a picture of his nightstand.


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## GURPS

Elon Musk Confirms Apple Is Threatening Twitter’s Presence In Its App Store​
“Apple has also threatened to withhold Twitter from its App Store, but won’t tell us why”



Now everyone from Joe “I am the Democratic Party” Biden to outraged lefties in Congress to hate-filled Hollyweirdos to stenographer left-wing activists to Big Tech have Musk in their sights.

The _Washington Post_‘s resident crybully recently penned a piece in which she urges Apple and Google to “Parler” Twitter, i.e. remove the app from their stores because seeing words from people she doesn’t agree with is a serious trigger and makes her cry. Or something.

And now Musk has confirmed that Apple is indeed threatening to remove Twitter from its app store (archive links here and here):


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## GURPS

​


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## GURPS




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## Kyle

She was such a cute, funny kid and then grew up into such a stupid, fascist ####!


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## Sneakers

Kyle said:


> She was such a cute, funny kid and then grew up into such a stupid, fascist ####!


That seems to be the norm for Hollyweirds, and it takes me by surprise when one grows up to be a knowledgeable, stable, thoughtful person.


----------



## Kyle

Sneakers said:


> That seems to be the norm for Hollyweirds, and it takes me by surprise when one grows up to be a knowledgeable, stable, thoughtful person.


----------



## spr1975wshs

Kyle said:


> She was such a cute, funny kid and then grew up into such a stupid, fascist ####!


I don't remember why I should remember her.


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## GURPS

Jonathan Turley Roasts Joe Biden After Elon Musk Drops Good News About Twitter's Future​







George Washington University law school professor Jonathan Turley, who has never been shy in his spot-on criticisms of pro-censorship forces on the left, responded accordingly to Musk’s announcement by roasting President Biden, who infamously declared just after the 2022 midterm elections and after being asked if he felt that Musk was a “threat to U.S. national security” that Musk’s supposed joint acquisition of Twitter was “worthy of being looked at” by federal investigators.


Turley wrote:



> President Biden however, has denounced Musk as a guy who “goes out and buys an outfit that spews lies all across the world.” He then claimed “There are no editors anymore. There are no editors anymore.”
> The President the added:
> _“How do people know the truth? What do they — how do they make — make a distinction between fact and fiction? There’s so much — so much going on. And we’re in the middle of this.”_
> Indeed, perish the thought that citizens might be left to pursue the truth on their own without the government or surrogates in the media framing it for them. How could we possibly “know the truth” without our social media overlords?
> Apparently, millions each day are signing up to do precisely that.
> As for Musk, he is predicting one billion users in a year. What a nightmare for many in Washington . . . one billion people discussing contemporary issues freely . . . without “editors” telling them what “the truth is.”



Whenever discussions about “misinformation” and “disinformation” take place, always remember that those who harp on the most about the dangers of both are usually the same ones who are the worst offenders (usually leftists) when it comes to mangling the facts, deliberately and otherwise. Not only that, but their _real_ issue is actually with the free flow of information and how to better control it because not doing so might cause ordinary citizens like you and me to think differently and to question the government, and we can’t have that now, can we?


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## GURPS

Twitter's First Transparency Reports Are Here and They're Eye-Opening​

Twitter has published its first set of transparency reports about how the site had operated prior to multi-billionaire Elon Musk taking over the company. Among the reports, the social media giant states they are no longer enforcing its COVID-19 "misleading information policy."


Musk had promised the release of the transparency reports, saying it is necessary to regain the trust of the public.


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## GURPS

Twitter erupts after Elon Musk mocks CNN with satirical chyron about threats to free speech​

Musk posted a picture of CNN’s Don Lemon on Monday alongside a satirical chyron that read, "Elon Musk could threaten free speech on Twitter by allowing people to speak freely."

Some Twitter users were confused about whether the meme was from an actual CNN broadcast. The image is originally from Geniuses Times, a satirical website that describes itself as "the most reliable source of fake news in the planet."


Nevertheless, Musk’s post prompted a wide range of responses, from conservative praise to liberal meltdowns.


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## GURPS

CIA analyst decries free speech 'nonsense' on Musk's Twitter, claims it will benefit Russian disinformation​

CIA analyst Bob Baer claimed that "Putin is going to be all over Twitter" thanks to billionaire owner Elon Musk’s policies for running the company.

He also stated that the "voice of the people" Musk claimed wants free speech is "Russian intelligence" looking to undermine American support for Ukraine. 

During a recent segment on CNN, the analyst argued that Musk’s pro-free speech attitude towards operating the company, particularly in the way he has decided to reinstate banned accounts and not suspend users for any speech, means Russian hackers will benefit.


----------



## stgislander

Really.... Russian disinformation... again?!!


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## Kyle

stgislander said:


> Really.... Russian disinformation... again?!!


They’re persistent… But not smart.


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## glhs837

stgislander said:


> Really.... Russian disinformation... still?!!



FIFY.

"Any speech we dont like is
a)racist
b)homotransbipocphobic
c) Russian or Chinese Disinformation"


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## Kinnakeet

spr1975wshs said:


> I don't remember why I should remember her.


Nice breast and likes kissing women and men and made a video at one time or another


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## GURPS

The Hill ran a story yesterday headlined, “Twitter Stops Enforcing COVID Misinformation Policy.” Uh-oh! Prepare for chaos!

After the announcement yesterday, professional fact checkers were upping doses of their antidepressants, fact checkers like Imran Ahmed, CEO of the the “Center for Countering Digital Hate,” who called the rollback of the covid-19 misinformation policy an “irresponsible decision” that puts lives at risk.

You mean, the policy’s rollback puts his POCKETBOOK at risk. Shut up, Imran, if that’s your real name.

Twitter also released the first statistics about banned accounts. Between January 2020 and September 2022, almost 12 million accounts were ‘challenged’ and over 11,000 accounts were banned for violating the policy. That’s a lot of ‘fact checking.’

Twitter also put up a new “transparency” dashboard. What do you think? https://transparency.twitter.com/











						☕️ C&C NEWS ☙ Wednesday, November 30, 2022 ☙ MEMORIES 🦠
					

Sticky-fingered nuclear department transvestite; more thoughts on Balenciaga; Twitter stops enforcing covid “misinformation” policy; Fauci has brain fog during deposition; Ukraine; and more.




					www.coffeeandcovid.com


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## LightRoasted

For your consideration ...



spr1975wshs said:


> Have never quite understood why mutilating oneself is desirable.



Well, when it comes to piercings? Those women that get their tongue pierced? At least you know what they are good at performing. So that is at least one piercing that is ............ well, the most functional in its application.


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## GURPS

Dark money network's anti-Twitter censorship campaign coalesces behind App Store attack vector​


The Dossier has already reported on the origins of the campaign and its backers. We identified Arabella Advisors, a dark money progressive advocacy group funded through sister entities by the likes of Bill Gates, the Soros empire, and a far-left Swiss billionaire, as the network behind the anti-Twitter cancel and censorship campaigns.

Given the success of their ongoing advertiser boycott campaign, these same operatives have set their sights on a new mission: removing Twitter from the invaluable Apple and Google App Stores.

 And there appears to be a coordinated campaign in major legacy media publications, many of which are influenced and funded by the dark money network, to convince the aforementioned App Store gatekeepers to pull the plug on Twitter. In recent days and weeks, The New York Times and The Washington Post, among other legacy media staples, have dedicated a considerable amount of opinion and pseudo reportage space to the App Store activism.

https://twitter.com/TaylorLorenz/status/1595900416231079936?s=20&t=xynAxE2y5U3GtBgA5UMvmw


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## GURPS

Elon Musk Isn't Paranoid, the Democrats Really are Coordinating an Attack On Him​






And Democrat politicians will use it all as a way to begin passing laws and coming down on Musk. They will do whatever they can to break him because in doing so they will eliminate a huge source of resistance to their narratives and agendas.

This is no longer a tinfoil hat kind of statement. We know they do this because we’ve seen it so often before and very recently and openly with the attacks on Donald Trump. The saga of the Democrat Party’s attempts to bring down one man has been nothing short of desperate and disgusting with open abuses by everything the Democrats have under their control. The House, Senate, media, intelligence agencies, and activist groups were all used as a way to collapse the influence of just one person, and they didn’t try to hide it either. They considered it a proud crusade, but in doing so revealed their hand.

Musk is, for all intents and purposes, the new Trump in the eyes and minds of the left. His actions could end up toppling a lot of hard work they’ve put into over the course of years, primarily establishing narratives that Democrats worked very hard to push on the people. If dialogues are allowed to flourish and information outside of what’s approved by the Democrat Party takes root in the minds of the people, it could upend everything. A domino effect could start with people asking themselves “if the Democrats lied about this then what else are they lying about?”


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## GURPS

Everyone seems to be all a Twitter​


Why so mad?

Most certainly, none of these organizations or individuals of a Leftist persuasion had ever expressed any of those same objections in all the previous years of Twitter’s outrageously heavy-handed, one-sided censorship/out-right election interference. This sudden concern is so confounding. As David wrote about this morning, the EU is _SO_ incensed, they are threatening to ban the app. I can’t imagine why. John and Jazz have both recently told us about Musk’s efforts to clean the site of AntiFa accounts – I know he’s wiped a ton of child traffickers, as well – and begin the era of transparency he promised.

What’s not to love?

Oh, the Left. It’s had the opposite effect on their little pointy heads, and they seem to be in a frenzied panic. I mean, look who righteously weighed in this afternoon…while making even less sense than she does on any given day.













_WHUT_.

Correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t Twitter a “private business”? Does not Musk _OWN_ said business, ergo has the right to run it as he see fit?









That’s what we were all told for years, as we were booted – sometimes permanently – as God knows what infraction caused the previous hierarchy to spaz, and _OFF WITH OUR HEADS_. “SILENCE, conservative peasant! _It’s a private business_.” *click* Of course, Warren wouldn’t know what “business” was if it hit her in the teepee, but she sure can spot a camera from a mile away.


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## GURPS

Jean-Pierre Dodges Question On If Biden Will Try To Shut Down Twitter If It Hosts Offensive Content​


“When you say that you’re going to be monitoring some of the speech on [Twitter], if you see something that you don’t like, would you try to shut Twitter down?” Doocy asked.

“So, look, you know, when you — when you talk about monitoring, you know, it is — I hate to break it to you, Peter: Just like everybody else, we very much monitor the news,” she responded. “We pay close attention to everything that you all are reporting, and — and Twitter is in the news a lot. And so that’s what we’re paying attention to. We’re paying attention to what is in the news and what is being reported on — on the misinformation that’s out there.”

*She then highlighted how leftist organizations have “been very vocal about their concerns as well.”*

“So, yes, we are reading what you all are writing, and looking at what you all are reporting about the misinformation that is out there,” she continued. “But, you know, I would hope that all Americans, including social media companies, civil rights organizations, as I just laid out, including Fox as well, will agree that we need to — you know, we need to — to, you know, call out hate speech and misinformation.”


yeah but WHO Judges Hate Speech and Misinformation


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## GURPS

A GOP With Backbone Would Support Elon Musk, Punish Apple, And Fight For Free Speech On Twitter​


Apple’s threat to remove Twitter from its App store for the crime of being a slightly more open forum for free speech under Elon Musk has been met with a chorus of outrage and substantive threats of congressional action by Republican leaders.

Just kidding. Republicans have barely said anything about it, and establishment Republicans have said nothing at all. With the exception of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who offered his opinion on a matter outside his purview as a governor, Apple’s threat to crush Twitter has been met more or less with silence, even from members of the GOP who consider themselves conservative. (Sen. Mike Lee, to his credit, tossed out a tweet saying Apple’s threat makes the case for the Open Apps Markets Act. But he’s the exception to the rule.) And though Apple leaders apparently smoothed over the “misunderstanding” with Musk on Wednesday afternoon, we have all seen this pattern: Big Tech’s anti-speech aggression always turns out to be a “mistake” or “misunderstanding” as soon as enough people notice.

This is why I’ve argued that actual conservatives, those who want to save the country and restore republic self-government, should stop calling themselves conservatives. At this point, the label amounts to an admission of failure and defeat, and might as well be the official title of those who desire above all to be the controlled opposition for a permanent leftist regime.


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## GURPS

Twitter's Former 'Truth and Safety' Poohbah Demonstrates Why We Are Ruled by Idiots​

In the past few weeks, there have been some cracks in the obvious collusion of Big Tech with the Deep State to decide what information you are allowed to hear. First, the “disinformation control board” formed by the Department of Homeland Security and chaired by some raving nutbag who thought censoring your social media communications while singing Mary Poppins songs was normal was shuttered; Former Disinformation Board Dir. Nina Jankowicz Says Biden Admin ‘Rolled Over’ After Criticism. Second, Elon Musk took the helm at Twitter: Fear Sweeps Twitter’s ‘Workforce’ as Elon Musk Plans to Fire 75% of Its Staff. Third, leakers started sending documents to Senators Josh Hawley and Chuck Grassley showing just how deeply entwined social media companies and the federal bureaucracy; see Leaked Documents Show DHS, the FBI, and Social Media Platforms Worked Together to Stop Debate on COVID, Hunter’s Laptop, and Election Integrity. Fourth, a “news” organization took some time to look at Hunter’s laptop and found that it was legitimate; CBS Authenticates Hunter Biden’s Laptop and Signals the Wheels on the Bus Are Coming for Joe. And yesterday, Twitter’s defenestrated head of “trust and safety” (lololol) Yoel Roth admitted, over two years after participating in the most significant election fraud since JFK’s father bought the White House for him that he was wrong, my colleague Teri Christoph covers that episode in detail In a Rare Moment of Liberal Truthfulness, Twitter’s Former ‘Trust and Safety’ Chief Admits It Was Wrong to Censor the Hunter Biden Laptop Story.

Roth’s hand-waving and excuse-making can be boiled down to one statement.



> “We didn’t know what to believe, we didn’t know what was true, there was smoke — and ultimately for me, it didn’t reach a place where I was comfortable removing this content from Twitter,” Roth said. “But it set off every single one of my finely tuned APT28 hack and leak campaign alarm bells.”



Even though Roth has a Ph.D. in communications and is the author of such hard-hitting journal articles as _No fats, no femmes, no privacy?_, _Zero feet away: The digital geography of gay social media_, _‘No overly suggestive photos of any kind’: Content management and the policing of self in gay digital communities_, and _Locating the “Scruff Guy”: Theorizing Body and Space in Gay Geosocial Media_, the first thought that should have occurred to him was it was not his job to decide what was true.


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## GURPS

Owens made the comments on Thursday during the “Candace Owens” show as she talked about people like Whoopi Goldberg, Gigi Hadid, Amber Heard, Jim Carrey and more who have left the platform since Musk’s takeover “because they just can’t bear free speech.”

“It’s very upsetting to them,” the host explained. “That the government is no longer controlling what we are saying to to one another via fact checkers and censoring story’s taking out the New York Post for sharing the truth about Hunter Biden. They need that. That’s a better world for them. They want a world that is not real, but a world that is controlled.”

“And so many of them have lined up, issued statements and said ‘You can no longer hear my thoughts in 180 characters or less, because I won’t stand for this. I won’t stand for the first amendment,'” she added.  “And the list of people reads sort of like a 1990s yearbook of people that, you know, you look in the yearbook in the nineties like, oh, I remember, I remember that person he peaked in elementary school or he peaked in middle school, peaked in high school.”












						Candace Torches D-List Exodus From Twitter | The Daily Wire
					






					www.dailywire.com


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## GURPS

Hunter Biden laptop bombshell: Twitter invented reason to censor Post’s reporting​

Twitter “just freelanced” its baseless decision to censor The Post’s bombshell Hunter Biden laptop scoop in the run up to the 2020 election — with top-level workers at the social media giant agreeing that controversial decision was “f–ked,” damning insider communications released by CEO Elon Musk Friday reveal. 

The chaos and confusion behind closed doors at Twitter in the immediate aftermath of the October 2020 Hunter Biden expose show that a small group of top-level execs decided to label the Post’s story as “hacked material” without any evidence — behind the back of then-CEO and founder Jack Dorsey. 

Musk tweeted a link to the account of independent journalist Matt Taibbi shortly after 6 p.m., who shed light on Twitter’s shady censorship decision by posting what appeared to be redacted emails between Twitter employees. 

The decision to censor The Post’s story was made “at the highest levels of the company,” according to Taibbi, but without Dorsey’s involvement.


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## GURPS

The Freak-out Begins After Elon Musk Drops Explosive Hunter Biden Files​





Ben Collins is the dumpster fire of a reporter who completely botched the Q-club shooting in Colorado, originally making all kinds of wild claims about him being a far-right purveyor of conservative thought. Yet, once the news broke that the shooter was actually non-binary, Collins quickly shifted gears, still blaming the right, but this time for supposedly having bullied the shooter. Heads I win, tails you lose.

Here, he’s going after Matt Taibbi, who received the Hunter Biden files in question and did a long Twitter thread on them. So let me get this straight. NBC News’ supposed disinformation reporter is not mad that something that was true was suppressed. Instead, he’s mad that the details of how that happened are being revealed. Makes sense.


Then there’s the most predictable take of all coming from Bulwark hack Tim Miller. Apparently, the contents of Hunter Biden’s laptop were “revenge porn.”













 

*The media is right wing ? What is this guy to the left of Mao ?*


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## GURPS

Let’s assume a user’s payment for Twitter is the copious personal data they collect. A public utility must provide service to everyone who makes that payment. And because all users must abide by the same rules, if name-calling were prohibited, then “TERF,” “misogynist,” “Nazi,” and a whole bunch of other slurs the Left loves to use against their ideological enemies would be banned. A public utility cannot discriminate, even if the Left wants it to.

*In a recent case that reached the Supreme Court, several users sued former President Donald Trump for blocking them on Twitter. They asserted that his timeline and their ability to respond were constitutionally protected. In his concurrence with the dismissal of the case, Thomas observed that a Twitter account could not really be a government forum if a private company could eliminate it on a whim. Twitter had suspended Trump’s account at that point.

“Today’s digital platforms provide avenues for historically unprecedented amounts of speech, including speech by government actors. Also unprecedented, however, is the concentrated control of so much speech in the hands of a few private parties. We will soon have no choice but to address how our legal doctrines apply to highly concentrated, privately owned information infrastructure such as digital platforms.” Thomas wrote in his concurrence.*

That could be why Thomas posited that social media companies might fit under the same rules that govern common carriers like phone services or places of public accommodation like movie theaters. The phone company cannot end your call if they do not like the opinion you are voicing, and a movie theater would be hard-pressed to bar you if you wore a MAGA hat to see the next Marvel Avengers film. This type of regulation could also prevent social media from throttling content from some media outlets while promoting others.











						When a Stupid Actor Mistakenly Agrees With a Brilliant Supreme Court Justice
					

Foaming at the mouth about free speech on Twitter, Actor Mark Ruffalo suggests the same remedy as Justice Clarence Thomas.




					pjmedia.com


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## GURPS

The Real 'Threat to Democracy': Dems Colluded With Twitter to Affect the Outcome of the 2020 Election and the Media Doesn't Care​


Last month I wrote an opinion piece titled, “Why Are We so Polarized? ‘Blindspot’ Shows How Americans Are Living in Completely Different Realities.” The article discussed a very cool website, _Ground News_, which shows how much play stories get on the left versus the right or in what they call the center-based outlets based on their political views. _RedState_ is no stranger to this: we serve a conservative audience—but we’re open (and proud) about it. The difference with so many other sources is that they are disingenuous about their approaches; they’re serving you up a liberal smorgasbord while telling you it’s straight news.

This roundup is just a snapshot of a moment in time, and the websites mentioned will surely update. But it illustrates that the 800-pound gorillas of “journalism” don’t even need censorship—they simply self-censor, and ignore information they don’t like. In what should be one of the biggest stories of our lifetimes—the (successful) attempts of politicians to collude with one of the most influential tech companies in the world to affect the 2020 presidential election—they are MIA.

_Ground News_ reported when Elon Musk announced that he’d release the internal files that only 11 percent of the coverage was on the left. So it’s no real surprise that once the news actually broke, they showed that less than 20 percent of the coverage leaned left (their definitions of center/right can be amusing to those of us who are conservatives, but give them credit for pointing out the bias at all).


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## GURPS

Twitter Execs Ignored Democrat Rep. Ro Khanna's 'Speech' Concerns Over Censorship of Hunter Laptop Story​

One interesting bit of information that’s been revealed is that on that very first day Democrat Rep. Ro Khanna, who represents the Silicon Valley area, contacted Twitter’s former head of legal, policy and trust, Vijaya Gadde, to express his concerns about “speech.” In response, as Taibbi writes, Gadde dove “into the weeds of Twitter policy, unaware Khanna was more worried about the Bill of Rights.”













Khanna replied with a very good take on the “hacked materials” issue and Twitter policy in light of _New York Times v. Sullivan_, the landmark First Amendment case. Khanna correctly points out that the Post should not be held accountable even if the materials are hacked, if their reporters weren’t the ones who hacked them. He wrote:



> But this seems like a violation of 1st Amendment principles. If there is a hack of classified information or other information that could expose a serious war crime and the NYT was to publish it, I think the NYT should have that right. A journalist should not be held accountable for the illegal actions of the source unless they aided in the hack. So to restrict the distribution of that material, especially regarding a presidential candidate, seems not in the keeping of the principles of NY Times v. Sullivan.



But there is another reason Khanna wants Twitter to slow their roll:



> I say this as a total Biden partisan and convinced he didn’t do anything wrong. But the story now has become more about censorship than relatively innocuous emails and it’s become a bigger deal than it would have been. It also is now leading to serious efforts to curtail Section 230 – many of which would have been a mistake.
> I believe Twitter itself should curtail what it recommends or puts in trending news, and your policy against QAnon groups is all good. It’s a hard balance.



Khanna, as a veteran of many political elections, knows what he’s talking about here – when a negative story comes out about your candidate, you ignore it until you can’t. Twitter’s policy made it where the censorship became the story, and that was bad politically — even if it was simply negative for Big Tech on Capitol Hill.


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## GURPS

Macron holds 'clear and honest' talk with Musk​


Macron tweeted that he voiced concerns about content moderation on the highly influential platform, which Musk, who also owns electric car giant Tesla, bought for $44 billion in October.

"I'll say it here, on Twitter, because it's all about the blue bird. This afternoon I met with (Musk) and we had a clear and honest discussion," Macron tweeted after the hour-long, closed-door sit-down at the New Orleans Museum of Art.

"Transparent user policies, significant reinforcement of content moderation and protection of freedom of speech: efforts have to be made by Twitter to comply with European regulations," Macron said.

The meeting came as Musk is facing pressure over his plans for Twitter and the site's ability to control hate speech and illegal content.


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## GURPS

Europe Tries Desperately To Rein In Elon Musk Because Free Speech Threatens The Regime’s Grip On Groupthink​

The EU’s gripe with Twitter, as indicated by Breton’s statements, is the potential proliferation of information and speech that threaten the entrenched interests of the ruling regime on the European continent. 

The fact that freedom of speech is largely a political phenomenon unique to the United States and that Big Tech found its roots in the same country isn’t a coincidence. Neither is the fact that in its earliest days, Big Tech’s pioneers insisted that their inventions would be used for the proliferation of free speech around the globe. The naivety of this nouveau neoliberalism was short-lived, however, as the cynical realities of running massive transnational corporations became all too real. 

Previously, Twitter was one of the international managerial elite’s favorite inventions because it allowed them to set and control the narratives that gave direction to the world’s governments, markets, and more. Now that these people have lost control of the machine that put them at the center of the universe, they want to see it stripped of all utility. 

Musk’s re-platforming of dissident voices on a massively popular social media platform that is taking steps, however imperfectly and incompletely, to no longer unfairly, algorithmically suppress counternarrative speech threatens the legitimacy of the EU. If there are enough anti-regime people in Europe who can successfully use the platform to mobilize the masses, what’s to stop another country from successfully organizing a populist, Brexit-style referendum and further delegitimizing the EU? What’s to stop faltering regional secessionist movements, like those in Catalan, from regaining momentum?


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## GURPS

Phony free-speech advocate Elon Musk bans prominent left wing Twitter accounts​


Right-wingers hail Elon Musk as a champion of free speech. He frequently boasts of his opposition to censorship in all forms and claims to defend the right of individuals to express their opinions, no matter how controversial they may be. In reality, Musk does not support free expression as much as he pretends to and is, in fact, opposed to its principles.

In Musk's view, free speech means spreading misinformation and personal attacks without consequence. Free speech that he finds offensive is, in his mind, not free speech. It's "spam," and he makes a habit of suspending the Twitter accounts of people he disagrees with.

From _The Intercept_:



> Several prominent antifascist organizers and journalists have had their accounts suspended in the past week, after right-wing operatives appealed directly to Musk to ban them and far-right internet trolls flooded Twitter's complaints system with false reports about terms of service violations.
> As the Los Angeles City Councilmember Mike Bonin noted on Twitter, the suspended users include Chad Loder, an antifascist researcher whose open-source investigation of the U.S. Capitol riot led to the identification and arrest of a masked Proud Boy who attacked police officers. The account of video journalist Vishal Pratap Singh, who reports on far-right protests in Southern California, has also been suspended.
> Among the other prominent accounts suspended were the Elm Fork John Brown Gun Club, an antifascist group that provides armed security for LGBTQ+ events in North Texas, and CrimethInc, an anarchist collective that has published and distributed anarchist and anti-authoritarian zines, books, posters, and podcasts since the mid-1990s.











Schadenfreude if true ... exactly what the Fascists have been doing to anyone they disagree with


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## Kyle

GURPS said:


> Schadenfreude if true ... exactly what the Fascists have been doing to anyone they disagree with


I guarantee you it’s lost on them.


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## GURPS

Several left-wing activists had their Twitter accounts suspended after a false-report campaign by far-right users​

"There's nobody minding the shop anymore," Loder said. "I know everyone that worked on Twitter's trust and safety team over the years has long gone and the team has been more than decimated. It's maybe 5% of the original staff, so what's happening is mass-reporting is allowed to succeed because there's no one double checking whether these reports are valid or not. So people are being suspended for silly things or over nothing at all." 

Far-right users like journalist Andy Ngo on Twitter have also urged Musk to address the "large number of Antifa accounts" operating on Twitter. Ngo specifically mentioned CrimethInc calling it an "Antifa collective." Musk then directed Ngo to report Antifa accounts.

CrimethInc said in a written statement to Insider: "We have been using Twitter since 2008. We have never so much as received a warning. On November 25, Elon Musk banned us at the request of a far-right troll who has made a career out of targeting those who oppose fascist violence.


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## GURPS

yeah about Chad Loder ......


LA Antifa member Chad Loder sued by woman for falsely claiming she's a criminal convict​

*An Antifa member from Los Angeles with a history of advocating deadly violence is being sued by one of his victims for defamation after he falsely accusing her in viral tweets that she is a convict of various crimes.*

Robin Nicole Patch, a UCLA's masters in public policy alumna, filed a claim against Chad Loder in small claims court in Los Angeles County earlier this year alleging she had lost work opportunities due to his defamatory statement that she is a convicted burglar and vandal.

"Robin Nicole Patch of El Segundo, CA attended the Proud Boys transphobia rally in Los Angeles last Saturday," tweeted Loder on July 8, 2021 along with photographs of the woman. "Robin, who makes "F*ck Antifa" videos, appears still to be on probation from a 2020 conviction for burglary + vandalism."

_The Post Millennial_ has reviewed court documents on Patch and can independently confirm that she was never convicted of burglary or vandalism, or placed on probation. A 2019 domestic dispute case in Los Angeles involving Patch was dismissed. She otherwise has no criminal history in California.  








Los Angeles Antifa member Chad Loder falsely accused Robin Patch of being convicted of burglary and vandalism

*Loder, from Redondo Beach, Calif., is a self-described Antifa member and full-time social media activist. He uses Twitter to post doxes on targets—a number of his posts have been removed by Twitter for violating privacy rules—and to call for violence. Several people have filed restraining orders against the 46-year-old ex-tech start-up founder. In a prior investigative report on Loder published by The Post Millennial, we reported on his history of making violent, racist and anti-semitic posts, in addition to being accused by leftist activist women of predatory and creepy behavior.*



No Angel, a Hero of the Fascists ....


----------



## GURPS

Why Elon Musk's Twitter takeover is a threat to democracy​


Propaganda

All that is needed to destroy the possibility of a democratic information space for particular political issues, such as climate change, is to provide a platform for, and give legitimacy to, would-be propagandists. But it is possible to generalise this strategy — to target the possibility of democratic legitimacy tout court, by destroying the possibility of consensus on any issue. To do so, one would need a platform that gave equal weight to all voices spreading conspiracy theories about every imaginable issue of public political concern. Kremlin operatives attempted this with their RT television channel. Musk is now attempting this strategy with Twitter.

It is clear why the fossil-fuel industry would want to undermine the possibility of democratically sanctioned action on climate change. But why would the world’s richest man want to undermine the legitimacy of democracy itself?

The answer, by now, should be clear. In a healthy democracy, a shared democratic information space allows everyone to speak truth to anyone. This is the essence of political equality. In a healthy democracy, a middle-class journalist can publish well-researched exposés of multinational corporations or spectacularly wealthy individuals that contribute to a popular consensus in favour of constraining their actions, increasing their taxes, or otherwise holding them to account. If one destroys that information space by nurturing the spread of mass suspicion, it will no longer be possible to marshal citizens against the powerful in this way.

For powerful individuals, democratic legitimacy is a threat, because it is a check on their power. Why wouldn’t one of the world’s most powerful individuals want to eliminate it?


----------



## Grumpy

GURPS said:


> Hunter Biden laptop bombshell: Twitter invented reason to censor Post’s reporting​
> ....
> The chaos and confusion behind closed doors at Twitter in the immediate aftermath of the October 2020 Hunter Biden expose show that a small group of top-level execs *and the DNC *decided to label the Post’s story as “hacked material” without any evidence — behind the back of then-CEO and founder Jack Dorsey.
> ...


:fixed:


----------



## SamSpade

I wonder if Elon Musk KNEW the kind of shitstorm he'd create with Twitter. 

Until a few years ago, his name was praised from the left for his brilliance and boldness. And in return, he gave them lots of money. He was their buddy.

The very WORST that can be said of him now with regard to Twitter is that he has allowed all them evil right wingers back on Twitter (well, except Alex Jones, but there you go). That is about the worst you can say. Maybe by kicking the asses of employees so used to the royal treatment for doing damned little had SOMETHING to do with it.

But this has repercussions everywhere - not just the United States government. Across the globe, the once high and mighty are disturbed that what everyone believes can now be shown to be true - that they were deciding FOR the masses, what stories they wanted them to hear and which ones would be silenced.

He now has everyone after him - for doing what, to me, on the surface, seemed to be just a small thing - showing that they censored material. Hell, doesn't every outlet on the Internet do that now? They're doing exactly what you'd expect a guilty but powerful person would do, when threatened - using every means at their disposal, to destroy him.

A man they LOVED so much just a few years ago, and gladly took his contributions.


----------



## PJay

Elon Musk bought a crime scene.


----------



## PJay

“A massive fraud of this type and magnitude allows for the termination of all rules, regulations, and articles, even those found in the Constitution.”

Very interesting...


----------



## PJay

wut..Elon Musk drops round 2 today...


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## PJay




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## GURPS




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## GURPS




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## GURPS

Twitter Co-Founder Decries Musk's Transparency, Reminisces About 'All the Things we Didn't Make Public to Protect Brave People'​
Twitter co-founder Biz Stone has been openly critical of Elon Musk’s actions since Musk acquired the platform, and engaged in a little whining on Friday during Matt Taibbi’s “Twitter Files” thread by asking why naming names was necessary and that it “seems dangerous.” Saturday night brought a few more tweets from Stone that seemingly admits that the site engaged in a lot more than mere censorship.






Jason Goldman, who was part of the start-up team at Twitter as VP Product before joining the Obama White House as its first Chief Digital Officer, then chimed in, saying:



> “This is the most painful part and where I get worked up. Honestly if the thing just died in a fire so be it. Sites die. But he’s acting with such a reckless and incurious disregard to the consequences of his actions. Because he’s never had to deal with any.”



Hmm. Seems like Goldman either has a bit of jealousy toward Musk or knows something the rest of us don’t. But, his words are pretty much par for the course when it comes to tech bros talking about Musk these days. What Stone had to say next is the real eyebrow-raiser.









 

Protecting Brave People My Ass ..... hiding from the criticism or consequences from their fascist / authoritarian actions


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## GURPS

Censorship by surrogate: Why Musk’s document dump could be a game changer​

The Russian disinformation claim was never particularly credible. The Biden campaign never denied the laptop was Hunter Biden’s; it left that to its media allies. Moreover, recipients of key emails could confirm those communications, and U.S. intelligence quickly rejected the Russian disinformation claim.

The point is, there was no direct evidence of a hack or a Russian conspiracy. Even Roth subsequently admitted he and others did not believe a clear basis existed to block the story, but they did so anyway.

[clip]

Censoring communications on Twitter is more akin to the telephone company agreeing to cut the connection of any caller using disfavored terms. And at the apparent request of the 2020 Biden campaign and the DNC, Twitter seems to have routinely stopped others from discussing or hearing opposing views.

The internal company documents released by Musk reinforce what we have seen previously in other instances of Twitter censorship. *A recent federal filing revealed a 2021 email between Twitter executives and Carol Crawford, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s digital media chief. Crawford’s back-channel communication sought to censor other “unapproved opinions” on social media; Twitter replied that “with our CEO testifying before Congress this week [it] is tricky.”*

At the time, Twitter’s Dorsey and other tech CEOs were about to appear at a House hearing to discuss “misinformation” on social media and their “content modification” policies. *I had just testified on private censorship in circumventing the First Amendment as a type of censorship by surrogate. Dorsey and the other CEOs were asked about my warning of a “‘little brother’ problem, a problem which private entities do for the government that which it cannot legally do for itself.” In response, Dorsey insisted that “we don’t have a censoring department.”

The implications of these documents becomes more serious once the Biden campaign became the Biden administration. These documents show a back channel existed with President Biden’s campaign officials, but those same back channels appear to have continued to be used by Biden administration officials. If so, that would be when Twitter may have gone from a campaign ally to a surrogate for state censorship. As I have previously written, the administration cannot censor critics and cannot use agents for that purpose under the First Amendment.

That is precisely what Musk is now alleging. As the documents were being released, he tweeted, “Twitter acting by itself to suppress free speech is not a 1st amendment violation, but acting under orders from the government to suppress free speech, with no judicial review, is.”*


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## GURPS




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## GURPS




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## GURPS




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## GURPS




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## GURPS

The Press' Panic Over 'Twitter Files' Reveals How They Manipulated the System​

What stands out initially is that seeing the internal communications that showed the Democratic Party leadership had a direct line with Twitter brass to call for the silencing of accounts and trends, we get the stark projection that took place the past couple of months. Many journalists decried that under Musk, Twitter would be a public square of misinformation that would taint the electoral process. Now, we see that the Democrats worked to enforce that very type of corruption.

In reaction to this last detail, many a member of the media class emerged to heap condemnation on this document release. It speaks volumes that journalists would have a sharply negative reaction to information coming out. Matt Taibbi was the primary source to deliver this initial cache of documents (Elon promises more are on the way), and it is telling that Taibbi would become a focus of scorn from other journalists. This ‘_How DARE he!’_ response echoes what we saw when NBC’s Dasha Burns dared report what she experienced when meeting with then-Pennsylvania Democrat gubernatorial candidate John Fetterman.

Deflection is a key trait in exposing these reporters’ hesitation to seek out facts. There may be no better source to typify the press position on this matter than NBC’s Ben Collins. He is the self-described misinformation guru at the news division, and yet when possibly the biggest collection of documents concerning that very topic emerges from a social media platform, Ben instead recoils like it is a pile of rotten brie discovered in the trunk of a car parked at the airport for two months.


----------



## GURPS

GOP Rep. Comer's 'Promise' Is Sure to Rock Twitter Employees Who Helped Suppress Hunter Biden Scandal​


The released information showed employees on Twitter’s legal, policy, and communications teams debating over whether to restrict the Post article under the company’s hacked materials policy, weeks before the 2020 election. What a “coincidence,” huh?

During a Friday night appearance on Fox News’s “Hannity,” Comer told guest host and former Republican Rep. Jason Chaffetz that he plans to haul every Twitter employee — past and present — who participated in the suppression before Congress to testify. As transcribed by Breitbart:



> Well, in January, Jason, when I take your old position as Chairman of the House Oversight Committee, I can promise you this: every employee at Twitter who was involved in suppressing the Hunter Biden laptop story will have an opportunity to come before Congress and explain their actions to the American people.
> This was a huge story. … But this story’s just beginning, Jason, because we’re going to have every single person at Twitter that was involved in this in front of the House Oversight Committee as soon as possible.



Oopsie.




I'm not sure the point, other than showboating, but ok


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## GURPS




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## GURPS




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## GURPS

Ex-Twitter Executive: Elon Musk Is Putting Us ‘In Harm’s Way’ By Showing How We Censored Content​


----------



## TPD

A different take on the release of the Twitter files.  Notice the word “laptop” doesn’t appear until about 2/3s into the article.  Basically according to the Post, the release was a dud. 


It was billed as a bombshell: Elon Musk, after rifling through his new company’s internal files, would finally expose how Twitter engaged in “free speech suppression” in the critical run up to the 2020 election.

“This will be awesome,” Musk tweeted, teasing the announcement with a popcorn emoji.

But by the time the dust settled Saturday, even some conservatives were grumbling that it was a dud. Musk’s Twitter Files produced no smoking gun showing that the tech giant had bent to the will of Democrats.



			https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/12/03/elon-musk-twitter-files/


----------



## TPD

Oh yeah -  I did a search on both CNN and MSNBC of “Elon Musk”. There were only 4 articles on CNN about the Twitter files and NO articles on MSNBC. Surprise!  Only the article I posted above showed up on the Washington Post website. Of course there were a dozen or more articles on FoxNews.


----------



## GURPS

More Federal Issues for Twitter as FEC Commissioner Reveals Filing Denying It Worked With Democrats​


Sean Cooksey, the current head of the Federal Elections Commission, looked over some of those exposed communications and he noted some items of interest. In particular, the internal communications showing how the Biden campaign and DNC officials had a direct line of communication within Twitter and that actions were being taken on the platform at the request/command of the Biden handlers sparked the interest of Cooksey.

This clearly displayed a relationship between Twitter and the Democrats. It is a connection that not only had been suspected and noted by numerous individuals and outlets but had been brought to the FEC as an issue to be addressed. When made aware the company response was one that denied this was the case.





The reason this came about was that the group The Tea Party Patriots filed a complaint with the FEC about Twitter’s actions towards stifling the Hunter Biden laptop story and the banishment of the New York Post account. It was alleged that this constituted an in-kind donation to the Biden Campaign. In its defense, Twitter’s lawyers wrote to Jeff Jordan, in the Office of Complaints Examination office regarding the charge.



> _The complaint asserts that Twitter made an impermissible corporate in-kind contribution to Biden for President, the principal campaign committee for President-elect Joe Biden, when Twitter removed from its platform two articles published by the New York Post that violated Twitter’s pre-existing, politically neutral Rules and policies_.



In offering a number of items of defense, one of the direct claims made by the legal team involved the denial of coordination with the campaign.



> _Twitter’s content moderation decision was not coordinated with the Biden campaign. The Tea Party Patriots Foundation does not allege any coordination in its complaint, and none occurred._


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## GURPS

Leftist Media Accuses Elon Musk of 'Doxxing' Twitter Employees Who Suppressed Hunter Biden Laptop​


Without a doubt, the left’s reaction to Elon Musk pulling back the curtain on how federal agencies, the Biden campaign, and Twitter worked together to suppress news about the documents found on Hunter Biden’s abandoned laptop (BREAKING: Elon Musk Spills the Tea on Twitter’s Suppression of the Hunter Biden Laptop Story) has given the most belly-laughs that we’ve experienced in quite a while. They started off claiming that Musk was victimizing a man in crisis — that would be Hunter Biden — because his sex trafficking, drug use, and general corruption are all symptoms of medical conditions rather than moral depravity (The Pathetic New Liberal Cope to the Twitter Suppression Bombshells — Who the Real Victim Is). That has mutated into, “oh, what’s the big deal about banning dick pics”; see Fake Conservative Media Uses Hunter Biden’s Genitalia as a Reason to Hide His Laptop Contents. From that, we’ve moved on to “the real victims are the douchenozzles who participated in the decision to banish all mention of the Hunter Biden laptop from Twitter. This tweet is by Twitter’s former head of “Truth and Safety” (yeah, I threw up a little in my mouth writing that), Yoel Roth (see Twitter’s Former ‘Truth and Safety’ Poohbah Demonstrates Why We Are Ruled by Idiots).








There is a clue that this guy has never participated in business or even written about it in the past. Confidentiality agreements don’t cover internal decision-making processes unrelated to the sale of the company. It is utterly stupid to say, “I’m selling you the company, but the documents and communications on the company’s servers are not yours.” Twitter’s former management team didn’t “allow” Elon Musk to take over. Their only option to the buyout offer was to fight a shareholder lawsuit they would lose.



> Relatedly, Musk has effectively doxxed a bunch of people, exposing them to death threats from MAGA crazies (see below). I expect this will lead to further resignations from Twitter – who would want to work for a boss who puts your life in danger? /7




Look, I’ve been doxxed. Twitter actively participated in that doxxing. These people were not doxxed. They were acting on Twitter’s time to do Twitter’s business. They weren’t secret agents. Their emails and Slack messages were not confidential once the company owner decides otherwise. They may be duplicitous f***s who deserve public ridicule, but they weren’t doxxed.


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## GURPS




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## GURPS




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## GURPS

What’s missing from the Twitter files: The truth about the FBI​



*Musk reveals that a crucial player in Twitter’s censorship of The Post was former FBI general counsel James Baker, a central player in the Russia collusion hoax, who had become Twitter’s Deputy General Counsel.*








Baker in an undated email urges on the censorship action because “caution is warranted.”

“At this stage it is reasonable for us to assume that [the Post had published ‘hacked material’] and that caution is warranted. “There are some facts that indicate that the materials may have been hacked while there are others indicating that the computer was either abandoned and/or the owner consented to allow the repair shop to access for at least some purposes. We simply need more information.”


----------



## GURPS

The Great Meltdown Is Just Beginning​

On Twitter itself run of the mill lefties bemoan these developments. On the pages of the Washington Post and from the TV studios of MSNBC the reaction turned hostile.

One marxist commentator going so far as to claim that by Twitter banning the Hunter Biden expose from the NYPost from being read that Twitter was upholding its rules of service because of the underage nudes contained on the laptop.

Nudes that all these lefties refused to admit existed.

Nudes of Hunter Biden doing illicit drugs.

Nudes of Hunter Biden copulating with underage relatives.

Putting the nudes aside however, the more scandalous and arguably more illegal and legitimately threatening to national security was much of the rest of content that existed (still exists) on the laptop. 

It demonstrates direct corruption of then Vice-President, and post Vice-President Joe Biden. “The Big Guy” is seen getting big slices of financial rewards for influence peddled from his drug addict junkie of a washout kid.

In all of the rage at Musk’s release of “The Twitter Files” not a single marxist progressive Democrat leftist acknowledged any of the facts of the laptop, the problematic censorship of the now verified NYPost’s original report, and why on this issue (and likely more to come) they will be unable to prevent future disclosures of such a nature.


----------



## GURPS

Musk says Twitter under his leadership will put pressure on mainstream media to be more truthful​
Musk in the Q&A told the audience that Twitter's goal under his ownership "should be toward truth," which he anticipates will also be a successful business model.

"If the new Twitter is successful in that, then the result would be that people will turn to Twitter to understand what is true, what is real, what narrative matters," said Musk, according to the Epoch Times.

He further argued the plan will "put a lot of competitor pressure on mainstream media and other social media companies to also be more truthful because otherwise they’ll simply keep losing people to Twitter.”

Musk also countered reports that advertisers are leaving Twitter over his control of the company.

He said the site will "become successful and gain share from other social media and it will force other social media to stop toeing the line."

The new Twitter, he said, will give users an "unfiltered narrative" and allow them, through tweets, to have a say in what is the story.


----------



## GURPS

Nick Sandmann Calls On Musk To Release Documents On Threats Twitter ‘Allowed’ To Be Made Against Him​


----------



## GURPS

Roth repeatedly mocked and criticized Republicans on his Twitter account during his time with the company. Roth initially stayed after Musk became CEO but eventually left when it became clear things would be very different.

"If there’s one takeaway, it’s this: What matters most in platform governance is how decisions get made. You can armchair quarterback specific choices and mistakes all day. But the real work is figuring out how to make principled decisions when all you have are bad options," Roth tweeted.











						Former Head of Twitter's 'Trust and Safety' Team Whines About 'Dangerous' Babylon Bee Joke
					






					townhall.com


----------



## TPD

Yoel Roth sounds like a pussy. Even the name suggests he/she is a pussy.


----------



## GURPS

TPD said:


> Yoel Roth sounds like a pussy. Even the name suggests he/she is a pussy.




he is just generating noise to be heard in the Progressive Press


----------



## GURPS

The Bulwark's Tim Miller has changed his tune on Twitter's censorship of the NY Post story
					






					hotair.com
				






Saturday the Bulwark published a story basically shrugging off the whole thing as a political sideshow for ultra-MAGA:



> While normal humans who denied Republicans their red wave were enjoying an epic sports weekend, an insular community of MAGA activists and online contrarians led by the world’s richest man (for now) were getting riled up about a cache of leaked emails revealing that the former actor James Woods and Chinese troll accounts were not allowed to post ill-gotten photos of Hunter Biden’s hog on a private company’s microblogging platform 25 months ago.
> Now if you are one of the normals—someone who would never think about posting another person’s penis on your social media account; has no desire to see politicians’ kids’ penises when scrolling social media; doesn’t understand why there are other people out there who care one way or another about the moderation policies surrounding stolen penis photos; or can’t even figure out what it is that I’m talking about—then this might seem like a gratuitous matter for an article. Sadly, it is not.
> Because among Republican members of Congress, leading conservative media commentators, contrarian substackers, conservative tech bros, and friends of Donald Trump, the ability to post Hunter Biden’s **** shots on Twitter is the number-one issue in America this weekend. They believe that if they are not allowed to post porno, our constitutional republic may be in jeopardy.
> I truly, truly wish I were joking.



He’s not joking but he is playing the same kind of partisan political games the Bulwark is always playing. There were at least 36 tweets in Matt Taibbi’s thread but Tim Miller only wants to talk about one of them (#8):






So someone pulled up those tweets in the Wayback Machine and they were all Hunter Biden porn:



> There was a tweet from a Chinese account featuring a naked woman on top of Hunter Biden, as well as a family photo. Two pictures of Hunter Biden’s penis, one with another woman in the background.



He concludes:



> To sum up what we learned: Big penis, little news, First Amendment not under threat.
> Musk and Taibbi have promised more editions of the “Twitter Files” in the coming days, maybe next time they won’t come up so limp.



His story apparently caught the attention of Lee Zeldin who saw it as part of a larger pattern surrounding this story.






That was certainly the more significant part and the part that has been the focus of most attention for years now. But also, it was a story about social media outlets shutting down content harmful to Democrats for no reason. The Twitter Files really underlined that there was in fact no reason for any of it. The people in charge seemed to be making it up as they went. There was also this tweet which indicated that at least one progressive member of the House, Rep. Ro Khanna, understood the problem as it was happening: “this seems a violation of 1st Amendment principles.”


----------



## GURPS

Musk's Twitter files shows real "disinformation" threat is America's former intel leaders​


One could almost forgive such a snap judgment in the moment, except for the fact — as the WSJ’s editors point out — that independent corroboration was available at the same time. Bobulinski spoke out repeatedly to verify the e-mails about Hunter’s business transactions were genuine. and the photos and videos spoke for themselves. Yet it took eighteen months for the New York Times to grudgingly report that the laptop and its materials were not “Russian disinformation,” and weeks after that for other media outlets to follow suit.

Here’s a thought: perhaps news orgs should rethink the idea of hiring ex-intel leaders as “analysts.” Especially those who have already demonstrated a predilection for lying, either in public or during investigations. If media outlets are interested in _actual news_ and analysis rather than sef-serving spin, that is.

Clearly, they have something else in mind.

The real disinformation threat didn’t turn out to be the laptop or the Russians. Strictly speaking, it’s not even the political hacks who left the intel community to peddle their manipulative crankery on television. It’s the media outlets themselves who hired perjurers as analysts and then pushed their perjury as truth through one national election and almost through another.


----------



## TPD




----------



## TPD

*more censorship of the laptop....








						Elon Musk slams Wikipedia for considering ‘deletion’ of ‘Twitter Files’ entry: ‘Non-trivial left-wing bias'
					

Elon Musk skewered Wikipedia for considering "deletion" of its "Twitter Files" entry in response to internet users' complaints the story is based on "nothing."




					www.foxnews.com
				



*


----------



## Sneakers

TPD said:


> *more censorship of the laptop....
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Elon Musk slams Wikipedia for considering ‘deletion’ of ‘Twitter Files’ entry: ‘Non-trivial left-wing bias'
> 
> 
> Elon Musk skewered Wikipedia for considering "deletion" of its "Twitter Files" entry in response to internet users' complaints the story is based on "nothing."
> 
> 
> 
> 
> www.foxnews.com
> 
> 
> 
> 
> *


  So were many years of Seinfeld.


----------



## TPD




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## TPD

Sneakers said:


> So were many years of Seinfeld.


----------



## GURPS

TPD said:


> tweet




Of course ... while progressives ran Twitter that was OK


----------



## GURPS

If Elon Musk Wants Twitter To Have Freedom Of Speech, He Needs To Allow Freedom Of Reach​


Not only is Musk continuing to limit the reach of certain users, but his perpetual ban of Alex Jones and suspension of Kanye West suggest violations of Twitter’s generalized “hateful conduct policy” have nothing to do with federal laws against harassment and threats and don’t care about upholding the First Amendment. Instead, what is and isn’t acceptable speech rests solely in the opinions of one tech billionaire. 

Before Musk took over, Twitter routinely shadowbanned, meaning it limited the influence of posts or entire accounts without notifying the user. For example, pre-Musk Twitter could stop users from seeing a particular person’s replies to tweets and finding a particular person’s profile in the search results. Twitter could also stop a user’s tweets from being visible in search results (even when searched word-for-word).


----------



## GURPS

Elon Musk vs Wikipedia: How new Twitter owner is exposing the left-wing bias of the user-edited ‘encyclopedia’​









OpIndia looked at the Wikipedia discussion of ‘Twitter Files’ on Wikipedia. While the creator of the article on Wikipedia, who goes by the username Wikisempra, has been trying to put forward his point that the article deserves to stay, several Wikipedia editors found it “nothingburger”. For those unaware, nothingburder means “something that is or turns out to be insignificant or lacking in substance”.

After it was suggested that the article should be deleted, Wikisempra expressed his dismay and said, “To suggest the article for deletion without a single argument on said suggestion is no way to conduct a Wikipedia where we attempt, to be honest. I took care in referencing and am still formatting said references – it is appalling that users would describe work as a “disaster” without saying why.” One of the editors at Wikipedia replied to him and called the Twitter Files nothing burger. “It makes sense to delete this nothing burger. It is not notable enough for its own article and should be in the main Hunter Biden laptop controversy article. The prevailing consensus has been that the files were underwhelming, not bringing to light anything that was not known about Twitter’s handling of the story beforehand,” he said. He also linked to a report from Newsweek to support his claims.


----------



## Kyle

Twitter ablaze as Elon Musk fires lawyer involved in suppressing laptop story, ‘Russian collusion hoax’


Senator Josh Hawley suggested the GOP should invite James Baker to testify about 'attempts to coerce' Twitter into 'election interference.'


Twitter ignited upon the news Tuesday that CEO Elon Musk booted former FBI general counsel James Baker from the company for "suppression" of information.

Journalist Matt Taibbi, who revealed the "Twitter Files" on Friday, shared an article about the now-ousted Twitter deputy general counsel Baker's connections to FBI controversies involving the Trump-Russia probe. 

The article, from New York Post opinion writer Jonathan Turley, said that Baker was "at the center of the Twitter suppression scandal." Turley also observed, "Baker has been featured repeatedly in the Russian investigations launched by the Justice Department, including the hoax involving the Russian Alfa Bank."











						Twitter ablaze as Elon Musk fires lawyer involved in suppressing laptop story, ‘Russian collusion hoax’
					

A former FBI official associated with the Russia probe was "exited" from Twitter after he allegedly vetted the "Twitter Files" without CEO Elon Musk's knowledge.




					www.foxnews.com


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## GURPS




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## stgislander

All this fuss over pics of Hunter's d!ck.


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## Kyle

stgislander said:


> All this fuss over pics of Hunter's d!ck.


That seems to be all Jessica Tarlov got out of it.


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## GURPS




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## GURPS




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## GURPS

Elon Musk fumes at San Francisco mayor after city opens investigation into Twitter headquarters​
The San Francisco Department of Building Inspection is launching an investigation into Twitter over reports the tech company has converted several office rooms into bedrooms for employees, according to KQED Supervising Senior Editor Ted Goldberg.

The department, in comment to KQED, said it's reaching out to building management to set up a "site inspection" and needs to make sure the building is being "used as intended."


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## Kyle

Well that was certainly handy for them.


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## Bare-ya-cuda

GURPS said:


> Elon Musk fumes at San Francisco mayor after city opens investigation into Twitter headquarters​
> The San Francisco Department of Building Inspection is launching an investigation into Twitter over reports the tech company has converted several office rooms into bedrooms for employees, according to KQED Supervising Senior Editor Ted Goldberg.
> 
> The department, in comment to KQED, said it's reaching out to building management to set up a "site inspection" and needs to make sure the building is being "used as intended."


They are going to attack twitter until they destroy it. Elon is the new Donald trump.  Instead of discontinuing to use the platform because they don’t like the new owner they will destroy it.


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## stgislander

GURPS said:


> Elon Musk fumes at San Francisco mayor after city opens investigation into Twitter headquarters​
> The San Francisco Department of Building Inspection is launching an investigation into Twitter over reports the tech company has converted several office rooms into bedrooms for employees, according to KQED Supervising Senior Editor Ted Goldberg.
> 
> The department, in comment to KQED, said it's reaching out to building management to set up a "site inspection" and needs to make sure the building is being "used as intended."


I envision Twitter HQ moving to Texas.


----------



## RoseRed

GURPS said:


> Elon Musk fumes at San Francisco mayor after city opens investigation into Twitter headquarters​
> The San Francisco Department of Building Inspection is launching an investigation into Twitter over reports the tech company has converted several office rooms into bedrooms for employees, according to KQED Supervising Senior Editor Ted Goldberg.
> 
> The department, in comment to KQED, said it's reaching out to building management to set up a "site inspection" and needs to make sure the building is being "used as intended."


KQED is the local PBS station.


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## GURPS

How Elon Musk Handled a Janitors Strike at Twitter HQ​

Elon Musk has a monumental task ahead of him as he continues to assume control of Twitter. He’s already exposed the dirty censorship operations we all knew happened behind closed doors, but it’ll take a lot more time before he has the reins firmly in his hands. Musk, the Tesla creator and billionaire tech innovator, offered $44 billion to buy the company, which entered legal limbo that lasted most of the summer. Now, Musk faced a labor dispute with the local custodian union. They were displeased that the company had fired some 20 workers and protested the move, so Musk terminated the contract, thereby jettisoning the entire janitor workforce.





Epic


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## Sneakers

Whuff.  I can just imagine the faces of those who got canned, wide open mouth, wide open eyes.

And now the lawsuits....


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## GURPS




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## GURPS

Elon Musk could move Twitter from San Francisco after ‘mattress’ probe​


“What is happening is an export of the moral framework of San Francisco to Earth,” Musk said during a Twitter Spaces conference Saturday cited by Bloomberg News. “This is kind of a big deal and problematic.”

Twitter, which was founded in San Francisco in 2006, has been at its Market Street location in the downtown Civic Center section since 2011. The lease on its headquarters, which occupies 379,000 square feet, expires in 2028, according to the San Francisco Standard.

The Post has sought comment from Musk.

The Tesla CEO has a history of uprooting his companies from California after feuding with the state over business regulations.


----------



## GURPS

Elon Musk's second installment of 'Twitter Files' reveals 'secret blacklists,' Bari Weiss reports​

The second installment of Elon Musk's so-called "Twitter Files" shed light on the company's practices of secretly "blacklisting" certain tweets and users.

"A new #TwitterFiles investigation reveals that teams of Twitter employees build blacklists, prevent disfavored tweets from trending, and actively limit the visibility of entire accounts or even trending topics—all in secret, without informing users," journalist Bari Weiss began her thread on Thursday. 

"Twitter once had a mission ‘to give everyone the power to create and share ideas and information instantly, without barriers.’ Along the way, barriers nevertheless were erected," Weiss wrote.


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## GURPS

'I'm treated worse than Hamas': Fury at Twitter's 'secret blacklist' and 'visibility filtering' as new tranche of files reveal conservatives were marked 'do not amplify' and COVID lockdown skeptics 'shadow banned'​


Twitter kept a 'secret blacklist' of topics and accounts to prevent them from trending, according to data obtained by journalist Bari Weiss - with conservative commentators deliberately downplayed in what one called 'Soviet-style bulls***',' while another said he was treated 'with more censorship than Hamas'.

Specialist teams were put to work, dealing with 200 cases a day. 

Conservative commentators such as Dan Bongino and Charlie Kirk were deliberately put on a 'search blacklist' - in the case of Bongino - or tabbed 'do not amplify,' in the case of Kirk.  

'They're treating my Twitter account with more scrutiny and censorship than the prime minister of Iran, than Hamas, than people who do actual terroristic type damage,' said Kirk.

'Now we evidence to show that's exactly why my Twitter account the last couple years has been down 95 percent in engagement.'

Bongino said it was 'Soviet-style bulls***.'

Those who questioned the prevailing COVID orthodoxy of lockdowns and mask mandates, such as Stanford's Dr Jay Bhattacharya, who argued that lockdowns harmed children, were also placed on a 'search blacklist.'  

Weiss made the revelations on Twitter Thursday nigbht in the second tranche of what has been termed The Twitter Files.


----------



## GURPS

Conservatives Blast the Twitter Blacklisting, Elon Promises Big Changes​


As journalist Bari Weiss detailed, conservative personalities like Charlie Kirk and Dan Bongino were “blacklisted,” with the visibility of what they were saying suppressed. Other people who said things against the narrative, such as for COVID, were also blacklisted, even if they were prominent scientists, such as Dr. Jay Bhattacharya.

All this was going on, even as Twitter denied it was happening. They claimed they didn’t shadowban, and they certainly didn’t do it based on political ideology. Yet, the files confirm it was going on.

Here’s what Jack Dorsey the former Twitter CEO told Dave Rubin back in 2020.


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## GURPS




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## GURPS




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## GURPS

Even though Twitter had written standards for what constituted violations, which could have been applied even-handedly and across the board, Twitter moderators routinely ignored the standards, and instead substituted their own subjective personal feelings or intuitions about a particular user’s intent.

For example, one internal memo documenting LibsOfTikTok’s final ban conceded that the user hadn’t actually violated any standards. But the reviewers concluded that Libs “INTENDED” harm by republishing insane lefty TikTok videos. Therefore: banned for her ‘intentions.’ The decision to ban Libs wasn’t made by some intern, either. The deciding committee included the highest levels of Twitter management.

One very odd thing is how secretive Twitter was about it. Why not just SAY you’re throttling someone’s account or shadow banning them or search-banning them? Why deny it? Wouldn’t it be a more effective “punishment” to tell people they’re in trouble?

Secrecy is something inherent with leftists. Communists always deny they are communists. I think maybe life isn’t exciting for lefties unless they feel like they’re part of a secret club or something.

I almost feel like this story isn’t “news,” since everyone knew that Twitter was doing it anyway. But it’s more than news. The exposure of what Twitter was doing is massively cathartic for a lot of gaslit people who had high-follower accounts but saw their hard work crumble after falling into the political crosshairs, or whose expert professional opinions were sidelined and silenced by some 20-something content moderator at Twitter.












						☕️ EXPERTS AND OMELETS ☙ Friday, December 9, 2022 ☙ C&C NEWS 🦠
					

Twitter Files part two; Sam Brinton back in the news; more SADS on live television; Celine Dion gets super rare autoimmune disease; kids self-harming in record numbers; Biden makes a bad trade; more.




					www.coffeeandcovid.com


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## GURPS




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## GURPS




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## GURPS




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## GURPS




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## itsbob

The liberal answer won't be to acknowledge, and fix it.. or even to deny it and ignore it.  We know their strategy.

They will investigate Musk over and over and over again, until they can 3 or more people to agree on a story about and against him.. they will put the machine in motion  to destroy him, and take his billions one dollar at a time by using their weaponized court, and bought and paid judges.  It will be miraculous if he survives the next five years, though I think the Liberal machine will be in high gear, in their attempt to ruin him before he moves operations out of San Francisco. He, nor his company, will ever get a fair trial there, and I'm sure they've already found him guilty of multiple felonies, they just haven't found their jurors yet.


----------



## TPD

Twitter Dump #3 taking place now.


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## GURPS

Twitter's 'Trust and Safety Council' Resigns in Protest and Elon Musk Evaluates Their Performance​


The “council” they were a part of was just as much an exercise in eyewash as was Twitter’s efforts to stamp out CSE material. This was just a sinecure to give some politically connected people visibility and a side gig to earn income. At least, I imagine they drew a salary for their participation in whatever the hell it was they did. They got to put the title on their business cards (by the way, the last name “Podesta” is what in Army CID they called a “clue.”) And they did, as our Brit friends would say, f*** all about the problem. Mike Cernovich addressed their accomplishments perfectly, and Elon Musk seemed to agree.







Their joint “resignation” is an obvious political statement — one of them should have been sent to a hospice for terminal TDS patients — to embarrass Musk.

If Elon Musk continues to have suppressing CSE on Twitter as a priority, he’ll be successful. There is no relationship at all between having a man who did his Ph.D. thesis writing about his experiences on Grindr (I’m not joking) and having a successful anti-CSE effort. Rather, I would theorize just the opposite, as the whole “Minor Attracted Person” (the English word is “pedophile,” but that hurts feelings) bullsh** is starting to infect the left in the way that transgenderism has. The solution is to throw enough technical resources at the problem to make the cost-benefit ratio of using Twitter for CSE unfavorable. The last thing needed is a battalion of “policy” gurus confusing the issues.

The bottom line is that before Elon Musk arrived at Twitter, it had shown little interest in combatting CSE on the platform beyond the amount needed to keep governments at bay. I think the reason for that clearly lies within Twitter’s culture. The only way to fix a culture so broken that it would not take down explicit images of a 13-year-old engaging in a sex act is to burn it to the ground and rebuild. Musk is doing that.


----------



## Kyle

Elon Musk called ‘worst boss of the year’ for ‘abuse’ of employees


The Post columnist said Musk had created a 'hostile work environment'

Twitter CEO Elon Musk is "hands down" the "worst boss of the year," because he expects too much from his employees, a Washington Post columnist argued on Friday.

The columnist also faulted the Twitter CEO for calling on staff to put in "exceptional" work.










						Elon Musk called ‘worst boss of the year’ for ‘abuse’ of employees
					

Twitter CEO Elon Musk was attacked as the year's "worst boss" by a Washington Post advice columnist who accused him of working his employees too hard.




					www.foxnews.com


----------



## GURPS

Musk Announces New Twitter Features, Reveals Company Targeted Political Candidates; Takes Shot At Biden​


----------



## glhs837




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## GURPS

Elon Musk Flat-Out Says Fauci Lied to Congress and Gain-of-Function Research Killed People​




> Twitter’s ruthless, Orwellian censorship of COVID-19 information, which occurred right up until Musk bought the company, was not only its most wide-ranging bit of malfeasance, but it was also the most damaging.



The many ways in which truth was silenced and harmful information was promoted by Twitter obviously had the effect of influencing the 2020 election, but the most damaging effects won’t fully be known for years. Unlike many of the things the left claims lead to death, Twitter’s actions did lead to death.

Musk’s tweet about his pronouns, predictably, led to a backlash from super upset liberals like Scott Kelly, who replied that Musk was promoting hate and that, by the way, “Dr. Fauci is a dedicated public servant whose sole motivation was saving lives.”


----------



## GURPS

*‘Great Barrington Declaration’ Co-Author Dr. Jay Bhattacharya Invited to Twitter Headquarters to Review Twitter’s Internal Slack Messages Regarding Content Modulation*



Elon Musk reached out to Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, one of doctors mentioned earlier this week in the Twitter Files release.

Jay Bhattacharya is also one of the co-authors of The Great Barrington Declaration.

On October4, 2020, top international epidemiologists *Dr. Martin Kulldorff* from Harvard, *Dr. Sunetra Gupta* from Oxford and *Dr. Jayanta Bhattacharya* from Stanford,  announced their scientific initiative to reopen society and resume life in the West for those who are not vulnerable to the coronavirus.  They called this The Great Barrington Declaration.

The top doctors argued that Fauci’s COVID lockdowns should be replaced with focused protection plans.  They had science on their side.  Over 930,000 public health scientists and members of the medical community signed on to the declaration since its inception.

Dr. Fauci and Dr. Francis Collins immediately launched an effort to discredit and silence this movement.  It threatened their control of the population.

Dr. Fauci, Dr. Francis and Dr. Lawrence Tabak, who took over NIH when Dr. Francis left, were threatened by this movement and decided to wage war on the doctors.

This email was sent out on October 8, 2020, just days after the Great Barrington Declaration announcement.









Twitter and Facebook then censored and shadowbanned any mentions of The Great Barrington Declaration after the complaints by Fauci and others.

Dr. Bhattacharya later lashed out at Dr. Fauci and Dr. Collins for their dishonest tactics to take down any doctors who challenge their highly flawed and dangerous positions.


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## GURPS




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## GURPS

ELTON JOHN QUITS TWITTER IN PROTEST OF ELON MUSK’S TOLERANCE OF DIFFERENT OPINIONS​


----------



## GURPS

Piers Morgan doubts Elton John’s Twitter knowledge in scathing jibe​

Reacting to the Tweet, Piers took a savage swipe at the legendry musician, writing: “I bet Elton doesn’t even know how to tweet.”

The users on the site didn’t appear impressed with the broadcaster’s remarks as one wrote: “That’s Sir Elton John to you Piers,’ while another penned: ‘Wish you didn’t tbh.”


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## GURPS




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## GURPS

Did Twitter Suppress Covid Lockdown Protests? Elon Musk Should Find Out​

A month into the Covid-19 lockdowns, anti-lockdown protests were taking place nationwide. Politico reported: “Facebook is blocking anti-quarantine protesters from using the site to organize in-person gatherings that violate states’ stay-at-home orders.” A Facebook spokesman said the company was removing posts “when gatherings do not follow the health parameters established by the government and are therefore unlawful.” Protest organizers’ Pages were also shut down by Facebook for violating its terms of service by allegedly inciting violence.

But protest organizers knew to encourage participants to wear masks, socially distance, and not carry guns to avoid criticism. How much did Twitter, Facebook, and other tech giants restrict protesters from organizing under the guise of concerns about health risks or incitement to violence?

While there were those calling for revolution and saying menacing things on social media, did groups clearly advocating nonviolent demonstrations get blocked too? What was Twitter’s policy on sharing posts inviting people to demonstrate peacefully?

We know tech giants acted to support heavy-handed Covid-19 policies. They suppressed content questioning Covid lockdowns, mask mandates, and vaccines. Anthony Fauci directly communicated with Facebook’s chief, Mark Zuckerberg, to control coronavirus information. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s digital medical chief communicated with Twitter executives about censoring unapproved opinions on social media.

As the Twitter Files have revealed, Twitter executives are about 99 percent Democrat and amplify and suppress viewpoints “quite a bit.”


----------



## GURPS

Elon Musk Just Ripped The Mask Off Liberal Media’s Fascist Little Brats​


“The Branch Covidians are upset,” Elon Musk tweeted Monday, taking at jab at the dogmatic liberals who pushed for lockdowns and online censorship during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Musk made the cheeky remark shortly before the fourth installment of the “Twitter files” dropped Monday afternoon. Sunday night’s report showed the massive campaign against Trump’s account following January 6, revealing that the platform’s censors deleted posts that contained a screenshot of a Trump tweet, even if that post was critical of Trump.

[clip]

After spouting the regime-approved line that social media censorship at the behest of government officials was not occurring, lackeys in the news media shifted the narrative almost literally overnight. Now the line is that censorship was undoubtedly occurring but it’s outright good that it was.

For anyone who’s been paying attention to the liberal media, Big Tech and the nefarious relationship between the two, the revelation isn’t as surprising at is vindicating.

Musk single-handedly confirmed that massive tech platforms are working with Democrats to circumvent first amendment laws against censorship and meddling in elections by suppressing news that harms their not-so-secret political agenda, as well as “shadow banning” accounts based on trumped up charges of “stochastic terrorism,” despite all of this being explicitly denied by high-profile journalists and top Twitter executives.


----------



## GURPS

Twitter Ends Trust and Safety Council​

The company announced in an email that it was “reevaluating how best to bring external insights into our product and policy development work. As part of this process, we have decided that the Trust and Safety Council is not the best structure to do this.”

When it was first launched in 2016, the council was composed of mostly left wing industry experts and organizations largely focused on restricting so-called hate speech. Original members included the Anti-Defamation League, Center for Democracy and Technology, Dangerous Speech Project, Feminist Frequency, Love 146, NetSafe, Samaritans, the Wahid Institute, and others.

Yoel Roth, the former global head of Trust and Safety who resigned after Elon Musk’s takeover of Twitter, was responsible for leading the team that suppressed the Hunter Biden laptop bombshell exposed by the _New York Post_.


----------



## GURPS

10 Million Views Of Child Sexual Exploitation Material Allegedly Watched On ‘Old Twitter’: Report​

A new report from the data analyst released Friday found that more than 95% of several active accounts exploiting CSAM, which allegedly included videos of children and teens involved in sexual activities, “acted with impunity for years.”

“The more we work on child sexual abuse material on Twitter, the more we find the HELL left by the old Twitter management,” Stroppa wrote in a Twitter thread.

Stroppa said those accounts have since been taken down.

Twitter’s alleged CSAM problem has been documented for more than a decade.


----------



## GURPS

#TwitterFiles No. 5 drop paints a damning picture of Twitter’s Maoist culture​

The zealots on Twitter’s bloated payroll (most of whom had graduated from America’s hard-left colleges), however, were having none of that. They were adamant that Trump had violated the policy against incitement. As one employee stated in the company’s Slack channel, it was “pretty obvious he’s going to try to thread the needle of incitement without violating the rules.” In other words, these proud products of America’s academic system firmly believed that they had to violate their own rules in order to prevent Trump from continuing _not_ to violate their rules.

Weiss has chapter and verse showing the Maoist employees demanding that Trump be kicked off America’s premier political platform, even as those given the task of analyzing his tweets could not twist them into anything approaching conduct that violated Twitter’s rules. Weiss, to her credit, makes the point that, even as Twitter was twisting itself into intellectually corrupt pretzels to silence an American president, it was an open platform for world leaders engaged in genuine incitement.

Those who remained on the platform were Iran’s Ayatollah demanding Israel’s annihilation, a Malayan Prime Minister calling for Muslims to “kill millions of French people,” the Nigerian leader inciting violence against pro-Biafra groups, the Ethiopian Prime Minister calling on citizens to take up arms against a region within Ethiopia, and India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s threat to imprison Twitter employees for restoring accounts he disliked. Twitter deleted their inciting tweets but did not deplatform them.

And of course, Vijaya Gadde, Twitter’s Trump-hating top attorney, tried to twist Trump’s word into “coded incitement to further violence.” In other words, if Trump says it, it must be an incitement to violence because his 75,000,000 supporters are all waiting to rise up. This mindset appears in a Slack conversation referring to an idea from the “scaled enforcement team”: “SCALE is asking if we would consider Trump’s Tweet for GOV. If we consider ‘American Patriots’ to refer to the rioters, they have a point.”


----------



## GURPS

The Council was comprised of about 100 people — volunteers including activists and “independent experts” from various human rights and other organizations from around the world — who weigh in on “safety, products, programs, and rules.”

Three guesses as to what politics most of those folks espoused and how that might have influenced the content moderation and the rules. Is it any wonder that conservatives were suppressed and silenced?

As we previously reported, three of the members of that council threw a tantrum and quit last week, because they were unhappy with the changes that Musk was bringing. Musk called them out for not doing enough to deal with child sexual exploitation (CSE) on the platform.

Musk said almost no one had been working on child safety which he was making his number one priority.










						Elon Cleans House, Latest Personnel Move Guaranteed to Set off Tantrums on Left
					

This is going to greatly improve things...




					redstate.com


----------



## GURPS

More From Whistleblower Report, Testimony That Blows Doors off What Was Going on at Twitter
					

What a horror show this was...




					redstate.com


----------



## GURPS

Elon 'stops paying rent on Twitter's San Fran HQ and offices around world - as he considers NOT paying severance to axed employees' and sells off woke items in cost-cutting exercise​
*Twitter has allegedly not paid rent on its headquarters or global offices *
*The news comes as Elon Musk continues to find every avenue he can to slash costs at the social media company, which he acquired for $44billion in October*
*Musk is also reportedly considering not paying out severance to the thousands of employees that have been laid off from Twitter since he took over *


Twitter has reportedly been trying to renegotiate the terms of its lease with the managing company that owns its San Francisco office building, Shortenstein.

But the relationship does not seem to be going well as Shorenstein and other real estate companies the social media company works for have complained to them, according to the Times, though it is unclear what the complaints were about.

In addition to sending its office supplies to auction as a way to save money, the company has also laid off its kitchen staff.

And one of the travel expenses Musk has refused to pay included a $197,725 tab for private flights which were taken the very week he took over the company. 

Numerous other travel vendors have also gone unpaid, according to the Times. 

The payment over that private charter bill has gone to court in New Hampshire.


----------



## GURPS

The Undeniable Truth About Leftist Threats to Leave Twitter​


… and also by way of an NBC News report which detailed “Why liberal Washington can’t quit Twitter.” It quoted numerous Democrats and other prominent left-wing figures/icons who said in so many words that they just can’t bring themselves to totally disconnect from Twitter even though they really, really want to:



> “I’m just coming up with coping mechanisms for how I can still use this thing,” said Alex Vindman, the former Army lieutenant colonel and National Security Council official who was at the center of former President Donald Trump’s first impeachment.
> […]
> But Vindman says he and his wife are likely not leaving anytime soon.
> “If there’s an alternative, I’m happy to go there,” he said. “It’s just that there aren’t any real alternatives.”



The Bulwark’s Molly Jong-Fast is another:



> “Until there is a viable alternative, I will be at Twitter and you will have to pry my fingers from my phone,” said Molly Jong-Fast, a writer who rose to anti-Trump “Resistance” fame and amassed more than 1 million followers.



Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) was also quoted as saying though he felt Musk “is an entitled jerk,” that he’s “in dialogue with my [Senate] staff” on quitting it. In other words, he’s sticking around.

AOC, of course, ain’t goin’ nowhere, either:



> “There is a line where it becomes too toxic,” said Ocasio-Cortez, who is a frequent target of online harassment and sometimes receives death threats. She’ll quit Twitter, she said, when it “becomes so difficult to use that I’m not able to use it as a form of effective communication.”


----------



## GURPS

Woman Finds The Bots Are Very Much Still On Twitter With Two Word Test​









						Woman Finds The Bots Are Very Much Still On Twitter With Two Word Test
					

Musk had earlier claimed that bots were dead.




					www.iflscience.com
				






It's a bullshit comparison ...  and Elon NEVER Said he Twitter Removed ALL BOTS


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## GURPS




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## GURPS

Twitter suspends CNN, NYT, WaPo journalists, Elon Musk alleges they're banned for 'doxxing' his family​
Among those whose accounts were permanently suspended include CNN correspondent Donie O'Sullivan, New York Times technology reporter Ryan Mac, Washington Post reporter Drew Harwell, The Intercept journalist Micah Lee, VOA correspondent Steve Herman, Mashable writer Matt Binder, former MSNBC host Keith Olbermann and former Vox journalist Aaron Rupar. 

Additionally, the Twitter account belonging to the social media rival Mastodon, which served as a safe haven for liberals who initially fled Twitter following Musk's takeover (many made their way back to Twitter). 

Musk, who described himself as being a free-speech absolutist, received backlash for the purge of his critics, many calling for him to explain why those accounts were suspended.


----------



## GURPS

'I do get it': AOC sympathizes with Musk after he banned nine journalists for 'posting assassination co-ordinates' of his location - as he asks Twitter users to vote in poll to decide if they should be reinstated and CNN threatens to leave site​

Representative Alexandria-Ocasio Cortez took to Twitter Thursday night to say she sympathized with Elon Musk's desire to prevent himself from being doxed — but still branded his ban on nine journalists 'proto-fascism.'

Her comments come after Musk suspended the accounts of at least nine journalists who he said tweeted links to an account which tracks the movements of his private jet, an action he likened to posting 'assassination coordinates.'

The congresswoman said 'I get get feeling unsafe,' noting that she has also experienced similar threats to her safety, and added that she felt the billionaire was 'descending into abuse of power' to try to protect himself.

Journalists Ryan Mac of the New York Times, Drew Harwell of The Washington Post, Donie O'Sullivan of CNN, Matt Binder of Mashable, Michah Lee of The Intercept, Steven Herman of VOA, along with Aaron Rupar, Tony Webster, and Keith Olberman, all found their Twitter accounts suspended on Thursday.


----------



## GURPS




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## PJay




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## PJay




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## PJay




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## PJay

Lindell be like


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## TPD

GURPS said:


> Jay Bhattacharya is also one of the co-authors of The Great Barrington Declaration.


Dr Bhattacharya was a witness for me in my face diaper case with the good doctor.  He was on zoom during our court case. He and I have a special connection!  Though I’ve never met or talked to him personally.   Since I paid for his testimony, can I say he was a former employee of Ridge Hardware?


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## GURPS




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## GURPS




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## GURPS

Media loses its mind after Elon Musk bars reporters from Twitter — years after shrugging about Post ban​


Musk’s abrupt pivot from free speech champion to censor elicited shrieking condemnation from political figures who ignored previous Twitter management’s 2020 censorship of The Post for reporting on documents from Hunter Biden’s laptop.

*“I get feeling unsafe, but descending into abuse of power + erratically banning journalists only increases the intensity around you. Take a beat and lay off the proto-fascism,”* wrote Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), addressing Musk

Other past cheerleaders for censorship, such as House Intelligence Committee chairman Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) joined the pile-on, with Schiff writing, *“The devotion to free speech is apparently not that absolute. But the hypocrisy is.”

Schiff notoriously and falsely called The Post “a newspaper promoting Kremlin propaganda” when a cabal of Twitter executives censored accurate reporting on the now-president’s son, citing a dubious “hacked materials” concern.*


----------



## GURPS

Christina Pushaw explains what the U.N. alarm about Twitter's journo suspensions is REALLY about
					

Reason for tantrum diagnosed.




					twitchy.com
				





The United Nations and European Union are joining up with people like Alexander Vindman and demanding an explanation from Elon Musk for the suspension of lib journalists and others. UN officials are “deeply disturbed” by the latest developments:



> The United Nations has joined the European Union in condemning Twitter’s decision to suspend some journalists who cover the social media firm.
> Reporters for the New York Times, CNN and the Washington Post were among those locked out of their accounts.
> The UN tweeted that media freedom is “not a toy” while the EU has threatened Twitter with sanctions.
> A Twitter spokesman told a US tech news website the bans were related to the live sharing of location data.
> Melissa Fleming, the UN’s under secretary general for global communications, said she was “deeply disturbed” by reports that journalists were being “arbitrarily” suspended from Twitter.
> “Media freedom is not a toy,” she said. “A free press is the cornerstone of democratic societies and a key tool in the fight against harmful disinformation.”



Oh great — there’s nothing else going on in the world that the U.N. should be more focused on?


----------



## GURPS

*DHS Warned Twitter That ‘Permissive’ Policies Could Enable ‘Russian Influence Operations,’ Docs Reveal*


“I asked if the [U.S. government] was tracking foreign threats related to non-presidential races,” Cardille wrote. After a long silence, an unidentified government official informed Twitter that the “government is not tracking foreign interference or threats related to down ballot races.”

To combat domestic radicalization, it was necessary for “private sector partners” to ensure effective collaboration with government agencies and fill any “information gaps” between the private and public sector concerning “potential attacks,” DHS argued in a separate March 3, 2021, product, according to Taibbi.

“Information gaps and challenges associated with the individualized nature of radicalization could be partially mitigated with increased collaboration between law enforcement, terrorism prevention efforts, and private sector partners,” the DHS product reads, according to Taibbi. “We judge these partnerships would improve our ability to detect changes in [Domestic Violent Extremist] trends and provide early warning of potential attacks.”


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## GURPS

Twitter’s top ranks riddled with ex-FBI employees​

Twitter’s top ranks were riddled with ex-FBI agents and executives, stitching the company even closer to the federal agency now under fire for leaning on Twitter to meddle in the 2020 elections.

More than a dozen former feds flocked to the company in the months and years prior to Elon Musk’s purchase of the social network in October.

The Post found FBI influence was considerably more significant than just James Baker, the FBI’s former general counsel who later worked in the same role for Twitter. He was recently fired by Musk for interfering in the billionaire’s efforts to come clean about past transgressions at the company.

The news comes on the heels of the latest Twitter Files disclosures which show how the agency dedicated dozens of agents to pressuring the company to remove political tweets it found objectionable. 

In some cases, the former G-men and -women held positions that would have put them close to company leadership directly involved in censoring The Post’s Hunter Biden coverage in October 2020.



Hopefully they were all fired in the purge


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## GURPS

One Twitter employee, Matthew Williams, joined the company in June 2020 as a “senior director of product trust,” after spending more than 15 years working with the FBI as an intelligence program manager and senior supervisory intelligence analyst. Williams joined Twitter the same month as Baker and in June 2022 was moved into the position of  “senior director of product trust, revenue policy, counsel systems & analytics.” He noted that this made him “co-lead of Trust & Safety.”

Dawn Burton, a former federal prosecutor who served as deputy chief of staff to FBI boss James Comey joined Twitter in September of 2019 as director of strategy and operations and counsel organization. Burton would have been close to the FBI’s Hillary Clinton email investigation due to her connection with Comey and the agency’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. elections.

It is also reported that Yoel Roth, the leader of Twitter’s Trust and Safety team, had regular meetings with the FBI in the run-up to the 2020 presidential elections and even joked about these meetings in internal company communications.

In a Dec. 21, 2020, declaration to the Federal Election Commission, Roth said: “I was told in these meetings that the intelligence community expected that individuals associated with political campaigns would be subject to hacking attacks and that material obtained through those hacking attacks would likely be disseminated over social media platforms, including Twitter. I also learned in these meetings that there were rumors that a hack-and-leak operation would involve Hunter Biden.”












						New York Post: Twitter Is 'Riddled' with Ex-FBI Employees
					

A recent report from the New York Post claims that Twitter's top ranks are filled with ex-FBI agents and executives. Many of these employees were swept away by Elon Musk's massive layoffs, but some feds are likely still on the payroll.




					www.breitbart.com


----------



## GURPS

Elon Musk Doesn’t Need An Excuse For Shutting Up Journalists On Twitter​


*The rules on censoring Twitter speech were completely random, inconsistent, and fake before. I don’t see why it should be any different now. *Besides, it was fun seeing the self-obsessed pro-censorship dummies behave this week as if they had become political prisoners after Musk, the new CEO of Twitter, muted their accounts for tweeting links to material live-tracking his private jet.

Suddenly, reporters at CNN, The New York Times, The Washington Post, and all the rest were scrambling to redefine what it meant to “doxx” someone. Until Thursday, when all of this happened, everyone understood doxxing to mean the publication of a private person’s contact information, like his home address, phone number, or account log-ins. I’d certainly assume that posting a live, minute-by-minute trace of a private person’s location falls under that umbrella.

But Axios’s Sara Fischer went on CNN Friday to amend that definition with a little extra. She said it was only doxxing if there was also “the intent of targeting someone.” Uh, no. That was never the necessary criterion.


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## GURPS

Corporate Media Can Stomp And Cry All It Wants, Its Special Twitter Privileges Are Ending​

“Everyone’s going to be treated the same. You’re not special because you’re a journalist,” Musk wrote in a Twitter post.

The crackdown on doxxing is personal for Twitter’s CEO. On Wednesday, Musk reported that his 2-year-old son named “X” was followed by a “crazy stalker” who had mistaken X for Musk. According to Musk, the stalker blocked the car driving his son and “climbed onto the hood.” The incident motivated Musk to suspend several high-profile journalists guilty of doxxing.

This caused the corporate media to fly into hysterics. “Elon Musk censors the press,” said one CNN headline.” “nprecedented,” stated the flabbergasted Axios. “Twitter suspends journalists who wrote about owner Elon Musk,” alleged The Associated Press. “Musk has begun banning journalists who have criticized him on Twitter,” whined Washington Post TikTok reporter Taylor Lorenz.


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## SamSpade

See, I look at Twitter as being an international, extremely popular and visible version of WHAT WE HAVE HERE, with restrictions on number of characters.

Which means, if you act up ENOUGH - you get dumped. However, since the board doesn't have the algorithms and security that Twitter does - you can just come back under another name. I never understand this - if you get booted from a bar or a club, why feel the need to come back?

And that means - similar rules apply. To be honest, I think THIS place is probably a LITTLE stricter with behavior and a lot more generous with content. People say outrageous things and re-post links saying stupid stuff - 

And the rest of us seem to get - it's a free country. Freedom of speech or expression MEANS YOU'LL PISS SOMEONE OFF. If you're only allowed to say certain things, we get to live in a world like "Demolition Man", where you get fined for saying obscenities and the powers will try to KILL YOU if you step too far out of line.

"_See, according to Cocteau's plan, I'm the enemy. Cause I like to think, I like to read. I'm into freedom of speech and freedom of choice. I'm the kind if guy who wants to sit in a greasy spoon and think, "Gee, should I have the T-bone steak or the jumbo rack of barbecued ribs with the side order of gravy fries?" I want high cholesterol. I want to eat bacon, butter and buckets of cheese, okay? I want to smoke a Cuban cigar the size of Cincinnati in a non-smoking section. I wanna run through the streets naked with green Jello all over my body reading Playboy magazine. Why? Because I suddenly might feel the need to. Okay, pal? I've seen the future, you know what it is? It's a 47-year-old virgin sittin' around in his beige pajamas, drinking a banana-broccoli shake singing "I'm an Oscar-Meyer Wiener". You wanna live on top, you gotta live Cocteau's way. What he wants, when he wants, how he wants. Your other choice: come down here, maybe starve to death._"

Think I'm kidding? Who already has tried to outlaw foods that are bad for you? And in some cases, succeeded?


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## GURPS




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## stgislander

Elon probably does need somebody to handle the day-to-day operations of Twitter.  It's finding the right person (a clone of Elon?) that's going to be the hard part.


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## Kyle

stgislander said:


> Elon probably does need somebody to handle the day-to-day operations of Twitter.  It's finding the right person (a clone of Elon?) that's going to be the hard part.


He should offer the job to Donald Trump.

The nationwide, simultaneous, head-splosions would be worth it.


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## stgislander

Kyle said:


> He should offer the job to Donald Trump.
> 
> The nationwide, simultaneous, head-splosions would be worth it.


It would be entertaining as hell, but Trump's too invested in Truth Social.


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## Sneakers

Honestly, I know the guy is a workaholic, but it seems he's investing a whole lot more time in Twitter than he needs to, and can't help but think his other projects may be suffering.


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## GURPS




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## GURPS




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## GURPS

Twitter’s top ranks riddled with ex-FBI employees​

Twitter’s top ranks were riddled with ex-FBI agents and executives, stitching the company even closer to the federal agency now under fire for leaning on Twitter to meddle in the 2020 elections.

More than a dozen former feds flocked to the company in the months and years prior to Elon Musk’s purchase of the social network in October.

The Post found FBI influence was considerably more significant than just James Baker, the FBI’s former general counsel who later worked in the same role for Twitter. He was recently fired by Musk for interfering in the billionaire’s efforts to come clean about past transgressions at the company.


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## GURPS




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## GURPS

Take for example Twitter’s former head of safety Yoel Roth, who has now fled home, a situation that might lead him to sympathize with the “safety” of any number of the conservative judges who have faced relentless organized mob protests. Roth wanted us to know that satire sites such as the Babylon Bee are dangerous. As Roth said in a wide-ranging chat with Kara Swisher, “We have seen from a number of Twitter accounts, including Libs of TikTok, notably, that there are orchestrated campaigns that particularly are singling out a group that is already particularly vulnerable within society.”

After Musk’s takeover and Roth’s departure, new Twitter internal reordering banned a number of accounts associated with child grooming and pedophilia, as well as (purely coincidentally, one is sure) a bunch of Antifa accounts, prompting violence from the group. Why were these accounts active under the content-moderation practice of the earlier group of Twitter officials, including not only Roth but former senior data scientist “Melissa” Ingle? Under the old regime, Twitter banned the mention of the word “groomer”, and restricted prominent users for using it, citing it as a slur against the LGBTQ community.

All this raises questions and hopes about what can be done about bureaucracy in general. If Twitter can efficiently run its core operation and bring back viewpoint neutrality after the majority of the managers are culled, is there something for Republicans to learn and apply to American’s national security bureaucracy? From NATO to the NHS to Twitter, bureaucracy acts the same way, banal and self-serving, zealously protective of its turf, expanding to the detriment and erosion of other organizational components, disdainful of those below and deferential to the powerful, functionally opposed to skepticism, and existing simply to justify its own existence. Twitter is an app that can ban you for writing something silly or cruel. It is important, but perhaps not existential. The American deep state can harass you, create a world where the process itself turns into punishment, or imprison you on absurd charges for life. But until Musk came along both were defined by layer upon layer of bureaucratic management. 










						Lessons from the Musking of Twitter - The American Conservative
					

If Twitter can survive without woke bureaucrats, maybe the national security state can, too.




					www.theamericanconservative.com


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## GURPS

Twitter colluded with Pentagon to run network of fake accounts around the world – including AI-created deep fakes – despite publicly claiming to delete government backed propaganda​
*Twitter worked with the Pentagon to promote a series of fake accounts claiming to be people based in the Middle East*
*The revelation comes from the latest installment in the Twitter Files - the eighth such installment, published this time by San Francisco-based reporter Lee Fang*
*Twitter 'quietly aided the Pentagon's covert online PsyOp campaign,' Fang said, in a time frame spanning at least the years 2017-2020*
*The work was done to bolster 52 accounts tweeting in Arabic, which promoted the U.S. policies in the Middle East*
*Fang said it was done despite Twitter having 'claimed for years that they make concerted efforts to detect' and 'thwart gov-backed platform manipulation'*


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## GURPS

But apparently, in Rupar’s view, he should have been considered an exception to the rule because he is an “independent journalist” who admittedly relies heavily on Twitter to promote his work. Relatedly, I should point out that a deceptively edited video clip Rupar shared on his Twitter page in March 2021 nearly got a Georgia sheriff’s deputy fired.

What about _his_ livelihood, Aaron? Or did that not matter to you?

In response to Rupar inadvertently admitting that he now knows how conservatives felt in the Dorsey/Roth era of Twitter, where we know that conservatives and other like-minded individuals were routinely flagged, suspended, and or banned for daring to engage in WrongSpeak — and sometimes at the behest of federal intelligence agencies and Democratic lawmakers — some conservatives gave Rupar the John McClane treatment:















						'Journalist' Gets the John McClane Treatment After Sudden Discovery About Twitter's Rules
					

'Welcome to the party, pal.'




					redstate.com


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## Kyle

Hate Speech Against African Americans Up 10,000% On Twitter

WORLD — Several watchdog groups have sounded the alarm over a concerning rise in hate speech on Twitter since Elon Musk took ownership of the platform. They say African Americans are being particularly targeted, as hate speech against them has risen over 10,000%.

"This is concerning," said researcher Merv Blubshank of the Center for Countering Mean People Being Hateful on the Internet. "Even more concerning is the fact that almost all the violent hate is being directed at one African American man in particular."

Several hateful messages noted by the organization include such as: "Go back to where you came from Elon Musk!", "I hope Elon Musk dies in a fire!" and "ELON MUSK! REEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!".

"We're concerned that African Americans will no longer feel safe online," said Blubshank. "This rampant hatred must end!"














						Hate Speech Against African Americans Up 10,000% On Twitter
					

WORLD — Several watchdog groups have sounded the alarm over a concerning rise in hate speech on Twitter since Elon Musk took ownership of the platform. They say African Americans are being particularly targeted, as hate speech against them has risen over 10,000%.




					babylonbee.com


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## GURPS




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## GURPS

The Epoch Times ran another revealing story yesterday headlined, “EXCLUSIVE: Internet Sting Operation ‘J6 DELETED’ Exposes How Twitter Manipulated Jan. 6 Narrative In Real Time.”

There are a lot of details, facts, and examples in the story, but the gist is that researchers working with the Epoch Times captured all the tweets related to January 6th while the Capitol protest unfolded, and kept track of which tweets were either promoted by Twitter, or suspended and banned. As you probably guessed, lots of conservative accounts and tweets were suppressed, but wild leftwing conspiracy theories and fake news were boosted.

*I’ll give you two egregious examples. The first one includes a series of Tracy Beanz’s tweets starting around 1:30pm on January 6th. Beanz, Editor-in-Chief of UncoverDC, was tweeting that a lot of the masked, hooded people attacking police at the Capitol looked nothing like Trump supporters. Then, at 1:53pm EST, Beanz tweeted, “The Trump crowd HAS NOT reached the capitol yet.”*

Twitter immediately deleted Beanz’s tweets and her account was permanently banned. Beanz’s account was just finally reinstated this week.





*The next example is President Trump himself. The researchers found that on January 6th, when Trump posted a video message calling for peace and to de-escalate the protest, Twitter disabled the message’s ability to be liked or shared. Then Twitter deleted the video and banned Trump from tweeting anything else for 24 hours. Meanwhile, Twitter was also promoting democrat lawmaker’s tweets criticizing the President for not doing anything to address the protest.*

Epoch noted that, according to dictionary.com, fascism is “a governmental system led by a dictator having complete power, forcibly suppressing opposition and criticism, regimenting all industry, commerce, etc., and emphasizing an aggressive nationalism and often racism.”











						☕️ WHITELISTED ☙ Wednesday, December 21, 2022 ☙ C&C NEWS 🦠
					

I squash the latest fear-mongering headlines over measles; a big jab study; N.J. schools re-mask for Christmas; Taliban outlaws college for gals; the newest Twitter files; J6 censorship, more.




					www.coffeeandcovid.com


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## Sneakers

And the J6 committee recommending action against Trump is based on totally incorrect and incomplete information.


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## GURPS

Republicans’ January 6 Probe Reveals Security Missteps, Finds Sergeant at Arms ‘Succumbed’ to Democrat ‘Political Pressures’​
The Republicans’ 141-page report explores at length the security measures taken leading up to the events of January 6, 2021, an issue they say the January 6 committee has “thus far ignored.”

The report serves as a counter document to the select committee’s anticipated behemoth conclusive report, which is expected to come this week after the committee held a final public meeting Monday summarizing its investigation and announcing criminal and ethics referrals.

“Leadership and law enforcement failures within the U.S. Capitol left the complex vulnerable on January 6, 2021,” the GOP report states. “The Democrat-led investigation in the House of Representative, however, has disregarded those institutional failings that exposed the Capitol to violence that day.”


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## Kyle

Sneakers said:


> And the J6 committee recommending action against Trump is based on hatred, envy, jealousy and corrupt, immoral and unconstitutional activities by said committee.


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## GURPS

The Principal Problem With Principles​

These leftist creeps celebrated us being censored, then Elon censored them, and they screamed about free speech, and some of us supported them.

No.

Stop trying to abide by your principles, unless you want to kill your principles. 

You see, the unstated and wrong premise is that if we demonstrate the value of our principles, like free speech, by defending them when the people who want to strip us of our rights suffer the consequences of their destruction of those principles, they will learn. But they won’t.

The lesson they will take away is there is no price for oppressing us, because there is no price for oppressing us.

They have to suffer. And then they have to beg for relief, which includes acknowledging their abuse of the subject principles. And they must demonstrate that they will not undermine those principles again.

Some conservatives lack the moral strength to hurt bad people. Pain teaches those too foolish or too evil to learn through other means, We should not seek to minimize or mitigate the consequences of their actions. If anything, we should amplify their misery. Our goal is to scare them into embracing the correct principles. And if that doesn’t work, at least they suffer.


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## Kyle

GURPS said:


> The Principal Problem With Principles​
> 
> These leftist creeps celebrated us being censored, then Elon censored them, and they screamed about free speech, and some of us supported them.
> 
> No.
> 
> Stop trying to abide by your principles, unless you want to kill your principles.
> 
> You see, the unstated and wrong premise is that if we demonstrate the value of our principles, like free speech, by defending them when the people who want to strip us of our rights suffer the consequences of their destruction of those principles, they will learn. But they won’t.
> 
> The lesson they will take away is there is no price for oppressing us, because there is no price for oppressing us.
> 
> They have to suffer. And then they have to beg for relief, which includes acknowledging their abuse of the subject principles. And they must demonstrate that they will not undermine those principles again.
> 
> Some conservatives lack the moral strength to hurt bad people. Pain teaches those too foolish or too evil to learn through other means, We should not seek to minimize or mitigate the consequences of their actions. If anything, we should amplify their misery. Our goal is to scare them into embracing the correct principles. And if that doesn’t work, at least they suffer.


 

Use their own weapons against them.


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## phreddyp

Kyle said:


> Use their own weapons against them.


No better response!


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## Kyle




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## GURPS

The Germans are trying to get Oilfield Rando kicked off of Twitter and failing​


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## GURPS




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## Kyle

Chaos Erupts As Twitter Introduces New 'Top 8 Friends' Feature


SAN FRANCISCO — Chaos erupted Monday after Twitter went live with a surprise new feature, which CEO Elon Musk called a "late Christmas present for twits everywhere." The new feature allows users to select a "top 8 friends" to feature prominently in their profile.

What was intended as a fun feature has created unfounded bitterness and hate, resulting in unprecedented drama as users discover they are not as close friends with some people as they thought they were.

Friends were destroyed, relationships were severed, and marriages were brought to their breaking point as Twitter users rushed to see whether or not they made their supposed friends' top lists.

*Musk claims his self-esteem is now through the roof because he's on everyone's top friends list by default and cannot be removed.*









						Chaos Erupts As Twitter Introduces New 'Top 8 Friends' Feature
					

SAN FRANCISCO — Chaos erupted Monday after Twitter went live with a surprise new feature, which CEO Elon Musk called a "late Christmas present for twits everywhere." The new feature allows users to select a "top 8 friends" to feature prominently in their profile.




					babylonbee.com


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## SamSpade

Kyle said:


> SAN FRANCISCO — Chaos erupted Monday after Twitter went live with a surprise new feature, which CEO Elon Musk called a "late Christmas present for twits everywhere." The new feature allows users to select a "top 8 friends" to feature prominently in their profile.


You know, I used to know people like this - but then I went to fourth grade. Dear God - because you don't make someone's Top 8, you'll cut it off?


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## spr1975wshs

SamSpade said:


> You know, I used to know people like this - but then I went to fourth grade. Dear God - because you don't make someone's Top 8, you'll cut it off?


If I have not met someone in person, they at best a friendly acquaintance.
I like what Quora does better, labels folks as Followers only.


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## Grumpy

SamSpade said:


> You know, I used to know people like this - but then I went to fourth grade.


Remember something like this in jr hi/middle school..Girls would make these books up with classmates names on pages. The books were circulated and you could make anonymous comments about each person..Being jr hi, some of the comments were brutal. I thought it was hilarious (and I got alot of nasty comments) but it destroyed quite a few kids.


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## SamSpade

spr1975wshs said:


> If I have not met someone in person, they at best a friendly acquaintance.
> I like what Quora does better, labels folks as Followers only.


On Facebook I’m very particular about who I “friend”. When I first got on, I wanted as many as possible and learned that I just got too much in my feed from people I really didn’t know that well. So I set rules.

If you’re a relative - that’s a given. I don’t turn down family but I do put on silence if their posts are just endlessly political. If you’re a close friend or family friend, then yeah, although I have been known to put on silent if you just keep bemoaning your life, your relationships, and so on. Every once in a while ok, but I have friends - easily ten times a day.

Lastly - they’re not actually friends - but basically - they deserve it? A person who has done so much for my parents, my family, my wife - I can’t not friend them.

Everyone else - sorry. I have to limit it somewhere.


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## RoseRed

Grumpy said:


> Remember something like this in jr hi/middle school..Girls would make these books up with classmates names on pages. The books were circulated and you could make anonymous comments about each person..Being jr hi, some of the comments were brutal. I thought it was hilarious (and I got alot of nasty comments) but it destroyed quite a few kids.


Slam books.


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## GURPS




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## Kyle

We definitely have a Marxist/Socialist rot inside this country that needs to be purged.


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## SamSpade

Who on earth would we trust members of an organization WHOSE PRIMARY TASK is to lie and keep secrets - to be in charge of "truth"?

Why not just grab pedos and hire them as kindergarten teachers?


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## GURPS

SamSpade said:


> Who on earth would we trust members of an organization WHOSE PRIMARY TASK is to lie and keep secrets - to be in charge of "truth"?




Leftists love there secret police


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## GURPS




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## GURPS

'Rigged the COVID debate': How federally enticed censorship undermined science during pandemic​

The social media company accomplished this, Zweig said, "by censoring info that was true but inconvenient to U.S. govt. policy," "by discrediting doctors and other experts who disagreed" and "by suppressing ordinary users, including some sharing the CDC’s *own data*."

Considerable pressure to regulate speech about COVID came from the federal government, Zweig said, citing internal Twitter files. "*oth the Trump and Biden administrations directly pressed Twitter executives to moderate the platform’s pandemic content according to their wishes," he wrote. 

Among the Trump administration's requests to Twitter was help counteracting "runs on grocery stores," a brief but high-tension period early in the pandemic when shoppers rushed to gather supplies amid fears of shortages. 

When the Biden administration came to power, the censorship expanded. The Biden White House, for instance, specifically targeted what was called "anti-vaxxer accounts," including longtime and vociferous COVID critic Alex Berenson, a former New York Times investigative reporter.*


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